Rick Neuoff

A Palm Beach County Commission candidate hopes to garner support through a proposed property tax hike on pricey real estate, according to the Palm Beach Post. Inspired by President Barack Obama’s call for increased taxes on the top 2 percent, Democratic candidate Rick Neuhoff is campaigning for progressive taxation on South Florida property. Identifying himself with the president could be a smart move in the Democrat heavy south county commission district, but his proposal may not meet constitutional muster. [more]

An omission has prevented approximately 9,000 property owners in Palm Beach County from receiving their property tax bills, according to the Palm Beach Post. Tax Collector Anne Gannon said the bills were never printed, and the error was discovered while performing an audit of the county’s 705,000 total tax bills, although she said it was not unusual. “We have bills like this every year where we have to reissue,” she said. The new bills are set to be sent out on Wednesday, and affected homeowners remain eligible for early payment discounts. [Palm Beach Post] [more]

Palm Beach County property values began to level off last year after a more than three-year plunge, according to appraiser Gary Nikolits. Preliminary estimates now show the county losing between 1.5 and 2 percent in property tax revenues this year, down from the 5 percent loss Nikolits had predicted in January. That would mean an expected budget shortfall of $30 million, down from $50 million, for the next fiscal year. The numbers won’t be finalized until July 1, but whatever loss Palm Beach County sees will come in addition to the 10 percent declines in property tax revenues it saw it the previous two years. [more]

With U.S. home prices down by almost a third from their spring 2006 peak, property owners are flooding city and state governments with tax appeals in a trend that’s sure to put even more downward pressure on already tight budgets, according to Businessweek. New Jerseyans filed a record 18,147 appeals during the last fiscal year, up 80 percent from fiscal 2007. Meanwhile, Atlantic City has used up its entire $26 million reserve for tax appeals, and the pending appeals on all casinos there have caused the city’s credit rating to drop to three levels above speculative grade, Moody’s Investors Service said last month. In Clark County, Nev., one of the most battered real estate markets in the nation, taxable property values fell to $184 billion this year from $263 billion in 2009, and the county will lose $514 billion in taxes as a result. Across the country, it’s becoming more and more likely that local governments will need to cut more services in the coming year as a result of that loss in revenue. In South Florida, however, tax appeals are actually now on the decline after a 22 percent drop in assessments between 2008 and 2010. [Bloomberg Businessweek]

With the April 15 tax day inching ever closer, Barbara Corcoran, founder of the Corcoran Group, has some ideas on how to slash one’s property taxes. She told NBC’s the “Today” show to watch out for inaccurate home value assessments, which can be off by as much as 40 percent, and will jack up the amount of property tax that you owe. Another thing to watch out for are basic assessment mistakes, Corcoran said, like miss-marking the number of bedrooms and bathrooms in a home.

Property tax appeals in Miami-Dade County rose to nearly 143,000 in 2009, after more than doubling from an average of 40,000 per year to 104,000 in 2008. The steep rise has forced the Value Adjustment Board to find more people to handle the appeals. More and more property owners are appealing the amounts, however small, as they struggle with falling home values and rising tax rates. Miami Dade Clerk of Courts Harvey Ruvin said the number would likely rise in 2010. While home values have plummeted, property tax revenue has actually increased nationally, by 2.7 percent to $421.8 billion, according to a report by the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis. [USA Today] Comments

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Property tax bills are making more South Floridians howl this year, as declining property values and strapped local budgets set up a clash of perspectives. Appeals jumped 40 percent in Palm Beach County, and 9 percent in Broward County this year. Miami-Dade has already matched its appeal rate from last year, but local authorities are not yet finished counting the appeals filed before the deadline last month. The rise comes on the heels of adjustments to the appeals process. In the past, taxpayers who sought to challenge an appraisal needed to prove that the assessment was wrong, but recent changes to state law have saddled appraisers with a greater burden of proof. [Sun Sentinel]

South Florida tax appeal firms say they are seeing an overwhelming
number of property owners hoping to appeal their taxes as the deadline
to file assessment appeals approaches. About 10,400 property owners had
filed appeals in Broward County as of yesterday, and 18,000 appeals had
been entered into the system in Miami-Dade County, with many more
applications yet to be processed. Property tax abatement companies said
they had seen as much as a 20 or 30 percent jump in business this year,
with property owners angry and eager to appeal because the assessed
values of their homes have gone down but taxes have gone up. [more]

Fort Lauderdale home owners whose property values didn’t drop last year will pay more in taxes, but most city residents can’t say that, and will see property tax cuts under a preliminary budget approved Wednesday. City commissioners said they would dip into reserves, cut vacant city staff positions and increase traffic fines through stop-light cameras.

Governor Charlie Crist was able to fix one common goof about real
estate, but has stuck to another, one with greater implications. At a
conference in Orlando held by the Florida Association of Realtors, he
had to redo a video when he persisted in pronouncing Realtor as
“Re-luh-tor.” He fixed that, but repeated his other mistake, which is
that property taxes are declining, an assertion he first made in 2007.
While recent buyers have seen the property values, and thus their
taxes, fall, longtime homeowners have seen steady hikes. Comments

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