Tax Assessor Question

Tax assessors aren't appraisers. They work with what information they have, which can be very little, and make best their best guesstimates sometimes. When I was an agent I used to have the assessor in my Parish call me from time to time to ask about properties so he could make fair assessments. Their jobs are pretty easy if a property has sold and they get that info, but other than that, they are doing the best they can. I know they would rather under assess than go over and have people bitching so you will see fairly low assessments from time to time.

The only time a tax assessment is going to approach FMV is when the house is sold, and that's only true if it wasn't a discount sale.

Especially in LA, appraisals are artificially low due to the laws in place on how assessors are to assess property. It's a huge pet peeve of mine. If we fairly assessed all property, we could lower our millage rates and more equitably share the tax burden. As it is, property is only reassessed, in absence of a sale of said property, every four years, and only if there are enough comps to support a reassessment.

To give you an example, we bought a house, we paid 70K over the assessed value, and our purchase price was 45K LESS than the list price and 25K LESS than the appraisal price.