Cathy Fox
LOCAL JOURNALISM INITIATIVE
ALLEYN-ET-CAWOOD – Local residents filled Bethany Hall in Alleyn-et-Cawood on March 15 to hear expert evaluator Charles Lepoutre explain the municipal tax assessment appeal process. An additional 743 people joined via Facebook Live.
The session was organized by the municipality and the Evaluation Task Force to offer residents a legal way to lessen the tax burden of increased property evaluations following a municipal reassessment that took into account unusually high selling prices and sale rates during COVID.
In recent months, Alleyn-et-Cawood has urged the MRC and other government bodies to eliminate the use of the comparative factor in evaluations. The comparative factor is an adjustment applied to municipal property assessments to align them with current market values between official assessment periods; however, this process isn’t perfect and can sometimes inflate property values unfairly.
Lepoutre provided the official form for requesting a reassessment and explained how to complete it. He stressed that residents should avoid comparing their property to their neighbours’ as an argument for revaluation. Instead, they should focus on aspects of their own property that may have been overlooked in the original assessment.
Lepoutre outlined five main reasons to request a reassessment: the property’s overall value isn’t in line with market trends; the land value is inaccurate; factors affecting the land’s value weren’t properly considered; the building’s value doesn’t reflect market trends; or key aspects of the building’s value were overlooked.
He advised residents that requests would receive a written response from the MRC between September 1 and October 1. Lepoutre warned that pursuing a negative result isn’t advisable unless there’s a difference of at least $350,000 in figures, given the associated evaluation and legal fees.
Lepoutre concluded by offering individual advice to residents about whether a reassessment would be worthwhile in their specific cases.
Photo – Expert evaluator Charles Lapoutre explains how to request a property reassessment at an info session held March 15 in Danford Lake. (CF)