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Rental apartments, houses, retail, commercial |
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How property tax works and what we can do about it. At the EIAA meeting in March we learned two important things. First, we learned the process on how to challenge a property’s valuation. Second, we learned the key to reducing overall property taxes. I want to focus on the later.
I was totally surprised to find out how our property taxes are calculated. It is totally backwards from how individuals or companies manage their money.
- The government body (city, county, etc…) creates a budget. - The Assessor calculates the total value of the real estate in the geographical area covered by the government body. - The budget is divided by the total value. This created the Levi amount.
If the overall value of housing goes down in the area, the levi amount actually goes up! So, it doesn’t matter if housing values go down significantly, your taxes will remain the same or even go up!!!
The key to getting the overall tax rate to go down is to lower the government body’s budget. In the past Blake Mueller said that hardly anyone shows up to challenge the budgets. We need to go to these meetings to make our voices heard. I have info on a few of the upcoming meetings:
City of Idaho Falls Call 208-612-8100 for the next meeting. All meetings are at 8:30 AM, upstairs in the Municipal services building of City Hall.
Bonneville County Go to http://www.co.bonneville.id.us/budget-finance.php for the most resent schedule. Meetings are usually held upstairs in the Centennial Court room at the old County Court house.
I am trying to find out when and where other meetings are going to be held. If you come across this information please send it to me. I will then send it out to the rest of the group.
We need to go to these meeting and make our voices heard.
Bart Weaver, President Eastern Idaho Apartment Association (EIAA) 535-8888 757-3829 cell |
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