tax protesting

[jm1fd]

So I have a choice: pay to the government or to these firms.

Horse boogers. You can protest it yourself and pay neither....or at least not pay the government more.

[musicman]

ok i had to be bitchy before the board today. don't ask how i moved up my date but i did.....i lowered my taxes 12.5 %.

evidently i told them that my neighbors didn't understand english sol they took that into consideration and lowered it.......but they would have lowered it moe if i had proof. now i will. the quote was "stop the tape"

Edited September 29, 2007 by musicman

[jm1fd]

ok i had to be bitchy before the board today. don't ask how i moved up my date but i did.....i lowered my taxes 12.5 %.

evidently i told them that my neighbors didn't understand english sol they took that into consideration and lowered it.......but they would have lowered it moe if i had proof. now i will. the quote was "stop the tape"

Why'd you move your date up instead of back? The longer you wait the lower the average value in the 'hood gets because more people have already gone ahead of you and protested....

[musicman]

Why'd you move your date up instead of back? The longer you wait the lower the average value in the 'hood gets because more people have already gone ahead of you and protested....

not in my hood. none of my immediate neighbors protest...when it takes 25 mins to go from 290 and 610 to hcad for a 1:45 appointment........i'm NOT waiting a week to go back before the board.

Edited September 29, 2007 by musicman

[RedScare]

By now, a large percentage of protests have already been heard anyway, so a week or two won't make much difference. My protest was a couple of weeks ago. I was able to knock off 2/3 of the increase at the informal hearing. I stopped there since my land value is so high that I doubted the board would go lower....and could have gone higher. My house is now almost as low as you can get it without virtually declaring it a teardown. From this point on, I can only play defense. I just looked up HCAD, and I am now the lowest value on my street. I think I'll have a fight on my hands next year.

Once again, pictures and other proof is critical. Just telling them that your house is crap doesn't do it. Find defects, even small ones, and take photos. Prepare ahead of time. The taxable value is January 1, so if you plan repairs or painting next year, take photos around January 1, so that you can prove that on appraisal day it was not remodeled.

[TAK]

do it yourself - it's very easy and you will, almost always, get a reduction. if you're going to pay someone 50% of the savings to do it, you might as well not do it, unless you are being overvalued by about $100k or so... (and even then, you aren't going to do $50k worse than the 'service', so they "save" you nothing.)

We just had our investment property lowered from $118k to $100k, and all we really needed with 6 month comps as ammo. we missed the "pre-hearing" and just went to the final.

HCAD knows they are generally over-valuing residential properties and are relying on you not coming in to protest.

[cwrm4]

I stopped there since my land value is so high that I doubted the board would go lower....and could have gone higher. My house is now almost as low as you can get it without virtually declaring it a teardown. From this point on, I can only play defense. I just looked up HCAD, and I am now the lowest value on my street. I think I'll have a fight on my hands next year.

I think it is easy to let yourself fall into a trap of thinking that the HCAD people know more about your 'hood than they really do. I consider myself very attuned to what real estate prices are doing in my section of the Heights - what teardowns are going for, what similar homes are selling for, what are the real trends in sale prices, etc. I also tend to get my snob on and think that Woodland Heights is superior to all other neighborhoods in Houston.

However, I have often found that the HCAD appraisers - who may hail from anywhere from Tomball to Freeport, don't know the difference between Woodland Heights and Channelview. In fact, most of my employees - who live in new $150k Katy tract homes - think I live in the ghetto since my house was built in 1910.

So, I think you have to set a value that can be defended purely on the basis of slightly massaged numbers, and don't let your own pride in you home or street (subconciously) compromise your attempt at achieving the lower possible protest value. I got $5k under last year's appraisal, which was already $20k under what I paid for the house several years ago.

It's kinda like the pinhead realtors who put in their ads "just look at HCAD on this house - the value is skyrocketing".

[amoxill]

OK tax protest question:

Is it credible to cite capped properties (i.e., those with either over 65 or homestead exemptions) when protesting for unequal appraisal? I have a Homestead Exemption and got popped with the standard max 10% increase this year. No sales comps to speak for as evidence on my side, but I have plenty of similar properties in the area that have certified values lower than mine. Only catch is that all have exemptions. My concern is that HCAD could counter that due to the cap, any citation of such comps is not valid for appraised value (regardless of market value...)

Anyone out there have any advice?

[jm1fd]

OK tax protest question:

Is it credible to cite capped properties (i.e., those with either over 65 or homestead exemptions) when protesting for unequal appraisal? I have a Homestead Exemption and got popped with the standard max 10% increase this year. No sales comps to speak for as evidence on my side, but I have plenty of similar properties in the area that have certified values lower than mine. Only catch is that all have exemptions. My concern is that HCAD could counter that due to the cap, any citation of such comps is not valid for appraised value (regardless of market value...)

Anyone out there have any advice?

I don't think that will fly. You'll have to use the market value for an unequal appraisal protest because in theory, all appraised values will end up at the market value eventually....cap or not. You should have plenty of ammo without that anyways. While crunching the numbers for my protest I found a house in my 'hood that is valued at $8 per square foot. The next lowest $/sqft in the hood is $28. They have mine just over $60. Absurd.

Edited October 31, 2007 by jm1fd