Defining ‘market value’
Dear Editor: There is a growing and pervasive concern by many property owners that Cole, Layer, Trumble Company has overvalued their properties during the recent reassessment of some 78,000 properties. The effects of over valuation are twofold. You will, in fact, pay more than your fair share of taxes, and your confidence, the essential fairness and integrity of the system, will have been destroyed.
The mandate to CLT was: appraise at market value as this approach offers the best opportunity for a fair and equitable tax apportionment.
What is market value and how is it determined? Market value is the historical record of the sale of properties. It reflects an arms-length transaction between competent adults who deal by mutual consent to mutual advantage. In essence, it is free enterprise working at its very best.
For mass appraisal purposes, I believe that recent sale price reflects the highest, best, and most compelling measure of the market value of that property, and any attempt to extend or modify this value should be viewed with extreme skepticism.
Overvaluation occurs when the new appraised value exceeds a recent sale price. Consequently, I asked the new “state of the art” CLT computer program at www.fayetteproperty.org to identify all sales of residential property within the city of Uniontown during the past year, with sale prices between $20,000 and $50,000. It also provided the new appraised value for each of the sold properties.
Next, I compared known market values (values measured by bonified arms-length sales) with the new CLT appraised values. The computer identified 50 such sales during the past year. A preliminary review of these sales indicates that two homes were torn down for a parking lot, 11 were appraised lower than market value, 36 were appraised higher than market and, in fact, one was actually appraised at market value. The conclusion: 72 percent of sold properties were overvalued. When we compare the total of sales at $1,692,054 to the total of appraisals at $1,989,243, the average over valuation for each of the 36 properties becomes $8,255.25.
The market has spoken and the facts are clear. We can only conclude that CLT has in fact consistently overvalued its appraisals of residential property within the city of Uniontown. For those seeking relief from overvaluation, study the market, present the facts and justice will prevail.
John Y. Chidester III
Uniontown