Property Tax Assessments 2019

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im2kull
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Re: Property Tax Assessments 2019

Post by im2kull »

beautyfromashes wrote: Mon Jun 10, 2019 9:34 am You do have to wonder how this will be spent. Will city officials reinvest to continue the rebuild? Will they pay down debt? Expand infrastructure/transportation? If the city saw a 10-20% increase in revenue, where would it go?
Ask Seattle
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chaglang
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Re: Property Tax Assessments 2019

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KCPowercat wrote: Thu Jun 13, 2019 4:12 pm Has anybody throwing a fit about this looked at comp sales?
I have. My complaint is that the assessments didn’t track the market very well. Our assessment seems in line with the comps and for that reason we aren’t challenging the assessment. However, the comps around us have been going up since 2012 but aren’t much different from 2017. They didn’t jump 450% in two years. But our assessment didn’t move more than 20% before this year. The assessments have ended up where the market is but the route they took to get there punched a huge hole in our budget.
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Re: Property Tax Assessments 2019

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That's a fair point.
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Re: Property Tax Assessments 2019

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im2kull wrote: Fri Jun 14, 2019 1:51 am
beautyfromashes wrote: Mon Jun 10, 2019 9:34 am You do have to wonder how this will be spent. Will city officials reinvest to continue the rebuild? Will they pay down debt? Expand infrastructure/transportation? If the city saw a 10-20% increase in revenue, where would it go?
Ask Seattle
Most of your property taxes goes to the school district.
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beautyfromashes
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Re: Property Tax Assessments 2019

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kboish wrote: Fri Jun 14, 2019 6:46 am Most of your property taxes goes to the school district.
Why?
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Re: Property Tax Assessments 2019

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beautyfromashes wrote: Fri Jun 14, 2019 10:14 am
kboish wrote: Fri Jun 14, 2019 6:46 am Most of your property taxes goes to the school district.
Why?
Because that is the law?
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beautyfromashes
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Re: Property Tax Assessments 2019

Post by beautyfromashes »

kboish wrote: Because that is the law?
Yeah, but the school district has a small fraction of the number of students that it used to, they have more buildings than they can occupy and haven’t really proven to be efficient with the money they have. That is the basis for my “why?” It seems the payments to the district should be based as an amount paid per student, not a percentage of all property revenue.
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Re: Property Tax Assessments 2019

Post by flyingember »

beautyfromashes wrote: Fri Jun 14, 2019 11:28 am
kboish wrote: Because that is the law?
Yeah, but the school district has a small fraction of the number of students that it used to, they have more buildings than they can occupy and haven’t really proven to be efficient with the money they have. That is the basis for my “why?” It seems the payments to the district should be based as an amount paid per student, not a percentage of all property revenue.
The state reports in amount spent per student.

https://apps.dese.mo.gov/MCDS/home.aspx
ADA is average daily attendence, so it's the amount paid based on actual student numbers that shows up

KC schools has a 70% graduation rate and $14.4k ADA
NKC schools which is highly diverse has a 95% graduation rate and 11.0k ADA

So in a ratio of dollars to graduation percentage
KC is 205:1
NKC is 115:1
nearly all white Liberty is 106:1

That it spends more per student is a common argument against the district.

NKC's tax rate is $2.768
Liberty is $4.7943
KC is 4.9599

Liberty's tax rate is 96.6% what KC's is but it's spending less per student.

KC's dropout rate is 9.4%. NKC's is 0.4%. Liberty's is 0.8%

So there's an argument to be made that it's not spending that's the problem but it's that families don't make their kids attend. Attendance is a fundamental. If you skip class you aren't there to learn. If you drop out you bring the graduation rate down.

https://www.kcur.org/post/kansas-city-s ... d#stream/0
This article covers the subject.
40% of students move at least once during the school year and 15% are enrolled for under 30 days
Educational attainment is dramatically higher for students who are consistently enrolled, it says 40 points higher.

Attendence is a known issue where funding is a boogyman. You won't solve their problems by taking money away. You will solve it by getting kids to class.
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Re: Property Tax Assessments 2019

Post by bobbyhawks »

Just got in from being out of the country for 3 weeks to find out about my 136% increase in property taxes. I'll echo what others have said in that my property assessment was way low for many years, but there are some crazy single year increases in my neighborhood. I used to think that the really bad elements of gentrification were somewhat avoided in KC since nobody was being forced to move due to rapidly increased property taxes and cost of living, but these increases will really hurt some. I'm all for more reasonable assessments, but there should be a cap on the single year growth in value allowed (over 100% with no improvements to the property is crazy).

Some of the valuations are very aggressive, and I'm not sure all properties in my area could be sold for the market valuation. My neighbor across the street has lived in the Westside her entire life, and they have a 223% increase in property taxes due almost entirely to the land value. From an affordable housing perspective, KC will never be successful if a few Dwell-style builds on a block can triple the neighbors' property taxes in a single year.
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Re: Property Tax Assessments 2019

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For lower income residents, affordability isn't just the ability to buy a house, pay a mortgage, or their rent. It's also utilities and property taxes. People working minimum wage jobs, other lower-paying jobs, and seniors on fixed incomes, can't keep up with big jumps in expenses.

That's why you see a lot of New Yorkers move to Florida when they retire. It's not just the weather. They can't afford the property taxes and high winter utilities once they go on Social Security. Many seniors are already stressed with rapidly-increasing prescription drug costs.
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chaglang
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Re: Property Tax Assessments 2019

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Totally agree about the cap, but it sounds like gentrification isn't the primary driver of this. After reading this I'd image that there are properties in areas that have seen little investment but received large increases nonetheless.
"The system isn’t changing, but the focus of the every-other-year reassessment process has tightened in Jackson County. Not since bi-annual reassessments were first required in the 1980s has county government tried this hard to strictly comply with a state requirement that the market values on the tax rolls accurately reflect what a piece of property is actually worth, rather than some fraction of it.

In hiring Beatty a year ago to head the assessment department, County Executive Frank White chose someone who believes it is her duty to follow the law without regard to the consequences. It’s up to school board members, city council members and other elected officials to adjust their levies downward to help cushion the blow on taxpayers, she says."
https://www.kansascity.com/news/politic ... 70483.html
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Re: Property Tax Assessments 2019

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chaglang wrote: Mon Jun 24, 2019 1:34 pm Totally agree about the cap, but it sounds like gentrification isn't the primary driver of this. After reading this I'd image that there are properties in areas that have seen little investment but received large increases nonetheless.
"The system isn’t changing, but the focus of the every-other-year reassessment process has tightened in Jackson County. Not since bi-annual reassessments were first required in the 1980s has county government tried this hard to strictly comply with a state requirement that the market values on the tax rolls accurately reflect what a piece of property is actually worth, rather than some fraction of it.

In hiring Beatty a year ago to head the assessment department, County Executive Frank White chose someone who believes it is her duty to follow the law without regard to the consequences. It’s up to school board members, city council members and other elected officials to adjust their levies downward to help cushion the blow on taxpayers, she says."
https://www.kansascity.com/news/politic ... 70483.html
I may have stated poorly, but my comment was more about the huge increase in taxes leading to realization of the worst elements of gentrification, and not that taxes were going up because of it. It sucks when a historic area slowly or rapidly loses its identity due to an influx of money, but in recent KC-history (for the most part), the influx hasn't priced people out of areas they want to stay in (save more urban areas like the Crossroads). With such sharp increases, I'm sure some people will reconsider offers to buy their homes from predatory banks/speculators/etc. At least with a cap on the single year increase, people know the limitations of how shocked they can be by an increase in property tax. I agree that Beatty is doing the right thing in executing the law, but I think we should create some additional rules to limit the impact of wild swings in the assessment.
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Re: Property Tax Assessments 2019

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Jackson County commercial property tax spike? Look at Plaza
When the Country Club Plaza complained about its property tax assessment two years ago — and won a reprieve — it cited equity issues. Jackson County seems to have worked around that fairness issue in a simple way: raise rates for commercial properties throughout the county.

On average, the assessed value of commercial property in Jackson County jumped 36%, compared with 16% on single-family homes and 18% on all residential properties, The Kansas City Star reports.
...
https://tinyurl.com/y4fej5yv
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Re: Property Tax Assessments 2019

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Pretty good coverage by the star today.
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Re: Property Tax Assessments 2019

Post by kcmiz »

Jackson County is right to do its best to match assessed values to market values. It makes the system more equitable and transparent.

Property taxes by their nature are progressive. The more your property is worth, the more tax you pay. If you don't like that, don't be a property owner or buy a less valuable property. Be a renter or better yet buy property that better suits your needs.

One of the main reasons property values are so high right now is because of tight supply. Household sizes are a fraction of what they were in the 1960s. Boomers are holding on to their McMansions. Does an empty nest couple or a widow(er) need a 3,500 sf 5 bedroom house?

If the city was serious about broadening access to more affordable housing, they could implement policies to encourage the market to increase housing supply. For example, legalize accessory dwelling units everywhere, up-zone single family zoning in all of city core to allow townhouses, duplexes, triplexes, and up-zone property around transit lines to allow apartment buildings.

Unfortunately, what I see is the opposite, city officials caving to NIMBYism to limit density (Westport Plan). People behind that plan are probably some of the same people complaining about their assessed values going up. The irony is they would benefit from density. More units mean a higher tax base that can support lower tax rates.

On the topic of rates, a higher assessed value doesn't by itself mean you have a big tax increase coming. Have the taxing authorities set rates yet?
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Re: Property Tax Assessments 2019

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The system isn’t changing, but the focus of the every-other-year reassessment process has tightened in Jackson County. Not since bi-annual reassessments were first required in the 1980s has county government tried this hard to strictly comply with a state requirement that the market values on the tax rolls accurately reflect what a piece of property is actually worth, rather than some fraction of it.

In hiring Beatty a year ago to head the assessment department, County Executive Frank White chose someone who believes it is her duty to follow the law without regard to the consequences. It’s up to school board members, city council members and other elected officials to adjust their levies downward to help cushion the blow on taxpayers, she says.
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beautyfromashes
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Re: Property Tax Assessments 2019

Post by beautyfromashes »

kcmiz wrote: Mon Jun 24, 2019 7:38 pmIf you don't like that, don't be a property owner or buy a less valuable property. Be a renter or better yet buy property that better suits your needs.
“Hey, granny on a fixed income living in the same house your bought with your now deceased husband 50 years ago and raised your kids in: time to start packin’!
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Re: Property Tax Assessments 2019

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It’s not unfair to think that Jackson County has an ethical obligation not to hike rates as quickly as they have. Residents have made life choices based on their household budget, including approving tax increases for things like the GO Bond. For most people, property taxes are a large part of that budget. The decades-long practice of below market assessments set the expectation with taxpayers that this just how things work, which is not unreasonable because very few of us are tax or county governance experts. I understand that the county is trying to come into compliance with state law, but not being in compliance didn’t seem to be a big deal to the state. The state wasn’t demanding the county comply immediately. So there’s no reason why the county couldn’t phased this in over 3-4 assessment cycles.
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Re: Property Tax Assessments 2019

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After reading the background I have no issues with what the county did. It's on the ones who set the dates to lower rates now to assist taxpayers. Will any of them do it? Lol
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Re: Property Tax Assessments 2019

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KCPowercat wrote: Tue Jun 25, 2019 7:49 am After reading the background I have no issues with what the county did. It's on the ones who set the dates to lower rates now to assist taxpayers. Will any of them do it? Lol
This is how I see it to. Appreciate the reporting of Mike Hendricks on this. It seems the County is correct in finally doing this.
I am very curious to see how jurisdictions respond. Will they lower rates? That is where the push should be. Not with assessments.
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