Home Assessment Value

[tripods68]

We received a letter this week from a local company stating that they will contact our Local Assessor's Office on our behalf for only $95.00 to conduct a reassessment of our Property. If the reassessment value did not result a decrease of property tax, they will REFUND 100% the money. I doubt this is a legitimate business but a SCAM. I wonder how many homeowners fell into this trap if any, and/or should I have reported them to local BBB? Anyway, I shredded the letter. But I'll probably receive another letter again as some point

[gamecock43]

Why would this be a scam? I heard that if you petition to get your home reassessed, usually in todays market it results in lower taxes.

[tripods68]

Why would this be a scam? I heard that if you petition to get your home reassessed, usually in todays market it results in lower taxes.

Something was not right IMO. First off, I don't need someone to call for us on our behalf and pay them $95.00 service fee when I can call myself for free and request a home reassessment. I have my Assessor's Office number on our tax bill.

Secondly, we have a law in the books (Prop 13) which triggers home reassessment of homes that have loss value in the past 12 months. So we should see a reduced property tax bill this year. I figured we shave our tax bill somewhere around $500.

Right now, our local Assessor's Office is automatically reassessing homes bought and sold beginning 2004. All homes sold and bought prior to 2004 must write or call Assessor's Office directly to request a reassessment which I intend to do next week. I know this because we got a letter from the Assessor's Office which tells us this for free.

Thirdly, the letter of the allegedly SCAM had a PO BOX address where to mail back the letter with the check. It doesn't tell me what name I should contact in case I have a question. It's just said mail in the check. Smell fishy to me.

[Seeker]

Yeah Prop 13 is and was an attraction for these people to send these mailings. For me the mailings serve a purpose of informing me that it may be time to look into the house value and whether or not a reassessment is needed based on the decrease.

The mailings are not necessarily scams, but these letters are sort of deceptive since they come with markings that mimic government symbols. And like tripod says, there's no phone number or anyone to speak with in most cases.

A lot of people don't know any better and assume that there are costs associated with reassessment; so they pay the money to do what is easily done without charge.

The first time I requested a ressessment, I called City Hall and was informed to come down there with the last property tax form (so I had the ID numbers of the lot) and fill out a form. It was absolutely free and since the TA's Office is a very short distance away, it was about 15 minutes work to fill out the form.

I haven't gotten any of these mailings recently, and I'm not sure that our property value has gone down very much either. Hmmmmm. Guess it's time to check again.