Chapter VII
The Importance of Your
Property Records
In
the last chapter I mentioned that a file exists on every property in a
municipality. That property card is the foundation of your value and taxation –
all the reasons for your property value are on the card or it can lead you to
them.
On
your property tax card or page, you will find the acreage or size of lot that
you supposedly own. I mentioned this last chapter but can’t stress it enough.
Go to the assessor’s office, all while being kind, curious, considerate and
gracious and ask for an assessor to speak to you about your property. Have them
explain the card and how they got to the value, especially when it’s a new
valuation. At this time, you may discover that you are being assessed for more
property than you own. It’s my experience that you have a one in five chance of
finding a mistake on how much property you own. These mistakes cause
multiple-year refunds.
In
a government office, you will get more with honey than vinegar and once you
understand your property card, you are very dangerous. Sometimes if you
are female, you get the right assessor and he’s willing to let you in on some
of the mistakes he sees that get made often. Shut up and listen to Romeo. If
you are a guy and have a female assessor, ride the same wave, nice flirting
works.
If
there has been a re-valuation, the manual will explain a sample property card
and what each figure or designation means, making it easy to figure it out on
your own. However if you can find an assessor who likes to talk, they will
eventually hang themselves with some simple fact or mistake that has
catastrophic effects on property values that may be in your favor.
But
if you can act oblivious and somewhat needy, get someone in the assessor’s
office to explain how the system works to you in plain language. At the age of
52, I have perfected this and it is the basis of most of my successes. Then
again acting stupid is easy for me and comes naturally.
How They Come Up With
Property Values
So
let me give you a frequent scenario and why challenging property tax values may
be the most fun business of 2010 and beyond in the United States.
Here
we go market value…Zippidy, Zippidy
do-da-day, “What’s your house worth?”
What’s funny is what your house worth today? Will it be worth the same in ten
weeks or three weeks?
You
see, there are three accepted courses to the valuation of real estate, market,
income and cost, but market value is the usual winner and how I got my ass
kicked in a big case (more on that later).
We
are not talking rocket science here. Most states will acknowledge that they
consider income and cost (which is mostly BS) and they most commonly rely on
market value. We have seen a global currency collapse so here’s my question
again, “What’s market value?”
I
think the real estate market isn’t even close to the bottom.
No
one has factored in what civil unrest will do to property values in large
cities. No one has factored in what is next for the dollar as it loses reserve
currency status and how different your life will be.
Worst
of all, no one has factored in war, which has become more and more of a reality
with each passing day. At the very moment I’m writing this, there is no war in Iran but there will be, and China and Russia
By
the way, I don’t think that 12/21/12 is the last day of the world’s existence,
but the Biblical prophecies are coming true. Whether you are a Jew, Christian,
Atheist, Agnostic or whatever…the Bible, Old and New Testament, are occurring
on cue, event by event.
No
one has factored in what the next big earthquake will do to California Los Angeles
written by Bradford Richdale
copyright Brad Richdale TM 2010 all rights reserved
