By Ruby Pratka

Local Journalism Initiative

Property values in Brome Lake will rise by an average of 51.8 per cent when the new evaluation role goes into effect in 2025, town officials announced last week.

“The value of Brome Lake’s taxable real estate holdings has risen from $2.14 billion to $3.25 billion. These values reflect market conditions on July 1, 2023, as stipulated in the Act respecting municipal taxation. The average value of a house thus rises from $507,700 to $772,200,” Town of Brome Lake spokesperson Ghyslain Forcier said in a statement.

Property tax bills for individual properties are calculated based on property values, determined by independent evaluators contracted by the municipality, and tax rates, determined by council and released along with the town budget each year. As a result, officials said an increase in a property’s assessed value might not automatically mean a higher tax bill. “While some may rejoice at the increased value of their assets, council understands this announcement may raise concerns among many of our citizens. I would like to reassure you that our elected officials will adjust tax rates downwards to reduce the impact of this new roll on taxpayers’ bills,” Mayor Richard Burcombe said in a statement.

Letters containing information on the new assessment notice will be sent out to property owners no later than Nov. 1. In the meantime, owners can consult specific data for each property on the GOnet portal, accessible via the town website. Information on how to contest a property assessment is also available on the website.

The town will hold an information session about the property assessment process on Nov. 6 at 6 p.m. at Centre Lac-Brome; representatives of Jean-Pierre Cadrin et Associés, the independent firm which carried out the property evaluation, will attend. Forcier said further information on how to participate in the session will be forthcoming.

Brome Lake director general Gilbert Arel explained that property values for the years 2025-27 are based on a property’s presumed resale value in July 2023. At that time, he explained, the housing market was still facing the effects of a pandemic-driven bidding war and relatively low interest rates. “When the government raised interest rates, it gave people a break, but prices are still high,” he explained.

Arel said the rise in property values in Brome Lake “was not surprising at all – I was expecting closer to a 60 per cent increase.”

“It’s an opportunity for the city; when property values grow up it means the city is in a good economic situation; if we were losing vitality, we would not have had that rise … but we also need to be careful to avoid people being overloaded with new taxes,” he said.

Rates expected to rise across the region

Patrick Lafleur is the coordinator of the property assessment department at the MRC Brome-Missisquoi, which handles property evaluation for the smaller municipalities in the MRC. “This year, we’re doing Bedford Township, Notre-Dame-de-Stanbridge, Pike River, Saint-Armand, Sainte-Sabine, Saint-Ignace, Stanbridge East and Stanbridge Station,” he said, adding that Bedford and Dunham will also release new tax rolls this year. “Even in the smaller municipalities, the value of land has exploded.”

Assessment roles for the ten municipalities will be released between now and Oct. 30. Lafleur said he is expecting property value increases of about 60 per cent in the western part of the MRC.

Marie-Hélène Croteau is the director general of the municipality of Saint-Armand. She said data from the provincial ministry of housing and municipal affairs suggests property values in Saint-Armand have gone up by an average of 69 per cent from 2022 to 2024, although the town’s 2025 role has not been released. “We’ve rarely seen rates that high – everything that happened during the pandemic is catching up with us,” she said.

Lafleur said property values usually fluctuate in cycles of seven or eight years. “We’re expecting prices to stabilize for the next few years and then rise again, but not on the scale of what has happened over the past couple of years,” he said. “In 23 years in the industry, I’ve never seen anything like that.”