It's that time of year again, and soon you'll be receiving information in your mailbox about your 2008 property taxes...
WHAT WILL MY PROPERTY TAX BILL LOOK LIKE IN 2008?
The Hillsborough County Property Appraiser sends out its new property appraisals, called TRIM (Truth in Millage) notices to homeowners in August. If you'd like to see your property assessment for this year
RIGHT NOW, the new numbers have already been posted online at
www.hcpafl.org. On the upper right, you will be able to search for your property by address or owner name (last name first, then first name with no commas).
WHAT SHOULD I LOOK FOR?
When you locate your property record, you will see two figures, your Just Market Value, and your Assessed Value. As you can imagine, most Just Market values have gone down. Normally, the Property Appraiser determines the value of your home on January 1 using sales from the entire previous year. However, after this year's steep price decline, in order to be more accurate, we have been told they obtained permission to use only 4th quarter 2007 comparable sales. As the market continues to come down, our assessments will always lag behind slightly.
ASSESSMENT MAY GO UP DESPITE MARKET VALUE...
You may notice that your Assessed Value has gone up despite the decrease in market value. Yes, this is possible. Back in January 1993, the Save Our Homes Act capped increases on assessed value at 3% per year on homesteaded property. In the years when home values grew 5-10% or more, the increase on assessed value was capped at 3% . Now you may see the assessments play "catch up", increasing the value by the allowed 3%.
HOMESTEAD EXEMPTION INCREASES TO $50,000
Overall, you will benefit from the increased homestead exemption, which has gone from $25,000 to $50,000. (FYI, this exemption occurs on the third $25,000 of your property value, that is to say, the amount between $50,000 and $75,000, so property valued between $25,000-$50,000 will be taxed. This additional exemption applies only to the non-school millage of your tax bill. (About one-third is school millage.)
If you have a question or dispute with your assessment, you have a statutory right to have a meeting in the Property Appraiser's office. We have met the General Counsel to the Property Appraiser, and can help you contact him directly should you need to.
Remember, Amendment 1 passed last year, allowing you to take your tax savings to a new residence. The difference between your Just Market Value and your Assessed Value is your tax equity. If you sold a home in 2007, and purchased another home, you can file to take your tax equity with you. The deadline was March 1, 2008. However, we have been informed that the deadline has been extended, and that you will have 20 days after your TRIM notice goes out in August. If you have any question about this, please contact us, and we can refer you directly to a contact within the property appraiser's office.
If by some chance you have received this e-mail and live outside of Hillsborough County, please feel free to pass it on to friends within Hillsborough County.
As always, we are here to answer your real estate questions.
Sincerely,
