Why your property tax bill could jump in 2019

The recovery of Mecklenburg County’s property values after the Great Recession has a dark side: the potential for significantly higher tax bills in two years.

Howls from homeowners when the county last reset property values, in 2011 when real estate values were at their lowest point, led to years of work to adjust them. The county paid tens of millions of dollars in refunds.

The next revaluation is due in 2019, and tax assessor Ken Joyner is trying to get ahead of the screams.

At the county commissioners’ annual retreat on Thursday, Joyner rolled out numbers illustrating how much property values have risen since the depths of the downturn.

Prices per square foot for residential property have risen 42.5 percent since 2011. Commercial property is up 101 percent, industrial up 45 percent and retail space up 77 percent.

A sample of homes that sold during the recession, and resold recently, showed widely varying price increases. Resale prices in District 1 (North) were up an average 21 percent; District 2 (West) 8 percent; District 3 (Northeast) 20 percent; District 4 (East) 27 percent; District 5 (South-central) 24 percent; and District 6 (South) 15 percent.

Some areas, including Steele Creek and west Charlotte, saw single-digit price increases. Homes in areas including Lake Norman and Darby Acres northwest of Charlotte went for as much as 48 percent more. Most homes were somewhere in the middle.

Not all tax bills will rise sharply. County commissioners adjust tax rates with new property values to keep total revenue flat or nearly so.

“We always calculate a revenue-neutral tax rate, so theoretically if the values go up we need a lower tax rate to generate the revenue that you need to provide services,” said county manager Dena Diorio. “So just because your value is going up, that doesn’t necessarily mean that your taxes are going to go up.”

“But people shouldn’t assume that they won’t see an increase in taxes, particularly people that ... really have extraordinary (value) increases. Even if you lower the tax rate, it’s likely they’re still going to see a tax increase.”

It’s too early in the process to divine what those bills will look like, she said. The county expects up to 55,000 “inquiries” after valuation notices go out in January 2019.

Amid the fallout from the 2011 revaluation, the county took steps including overhauling the Board of Equalization and Review, which hears valuation appeals; hired more staff; and created a permanent revaluation division.

“Looking back at 2011, there’s no doubt there were lots of issues over revaluation,” Joyner said in an interview. “You don’t have these types of citizen concerns without something being there.”

Work on the 2019 revaluation began with site visits to many of the county’s 365,000 parcels, starting with the problem sites identified after the previous process. More than 150,000 properties have been visited so far.

Among other changes: Property value appeals will be heard at multiple locations instead of solely at the central office. Joyner’s staff is also using technology such as new software to better communicate with taxpayers.

“We are 100 percent customer focused,” he said. “We’re going to steps I don’t think anybody in North Carolina has gone to to let citizens be heard and responded to.”

This story was originally published January 27, 2017 at 2:20 PM with the headline "Why your property tax bill could jump in 2019."