BATH

As Bath begins its first revaluation since 2005, City Assessor Brenda Cummings says she doesn’t expect any major changes.

“(Revaluation) will have a range of impacts, but overall we should be about the same when we’re done. Hopefully, we’ll have some growth in value,” said Cummings. “Growth is always good. It reduces the mil rate.”

Municipalities assess the values of properties to determine their tax rate and equitably distribute the tax burden among property owners. But values change over time, so municipalities periodically have to conduct revaluations, adjusting currently assessed values to the market rate.

“The reason why it’s important to do that in any given municipality — over a period of time like that — certain parts of the community may increase in value. Say you’re near a lake, and certain parts might not increase nearly as much, like say you’re not near a lake,” said Eric Conrad, director of Communication & Educational Services at the Maine Municipal Association. “That’s why revaluations are important and need to be done: Because things do shift over time.

“Municipalities try to and should revalue about every 10 years. Sometimes it’s a little more. It can be difficult,” said Conrad.

It’s been nearly 13 years since Bath’s last revaluation in 2005. Before Brunswick’s latest revaluation in 2017, the town had gone nearly 20 years without a revaluation.

“Revaluations are often called ‘equalizations’ — because the goal is to equalize the tax burden between taxpayers. That will be particularly true for us in Bath for the 2019 revaluation,” said Cummings.

In 2005, the revaluation lead to a shift of the tax burden onto residential property owners, with two-thirds seeing their properties assessed for a higher value than the prior year, said Cummings. That shift was due to the fact that the housing market in Bath had increased significantly since the prior revaluation.

“The last revaluation in 2005 really captured a time when housing was appreciating a lot, so we really saw a shift to residential property taxpayers,” said Cummings.

“I don’t think we’re going to see that this time because there hasn’t been a lot of change overall.”

Still, individual property owners could see shifts in their value. Though the city tries to keep assessments up to date by looking at building permits and other changes requiring city approval, there are some changes that simply won’t get taken into account without a revaluation. The biggest changes will come to the properties that are “most out of whack” with their market rate, said Cummings. Still, individual increases in value does not necessarily lead to higher taxes.

“Individuals will see a shift in their value up or down,” said Cummings. “Whether their value goes up or down doesn’t necessarily mean that their taxes will go up or down accordingly. It depends on how much value overall changes in the city.”

“It’s a fairness issue, though it’s not always perceived that way because you might have lived in your home for a long time … and you think my taxes have gone up but now they’re going to go up again because they’re saying my home I bought for $100,000 is now worth $325,000 or something. But the truth is, if $325,000 is the market value then it should be assessed at that,” said Conrad.

According to Cummings, city-wide values in Bath are near 100 percent of market rate on average, which is the city’s goal. That means that there likely won’t be any unexpected shifts in value.

“I’m optimistic that the shift will not be huge, because again, on average we’re at 100 percent of market value,” said Cummings. “The difficulty is that since it has been so long, the range away from that median is becoming wider and wider.”

When Brunswick completed its most recent revaluation in 2017, the town moved from valuing real estate from 70 percent of market rate to 100 percent of market rate. That led to a lower tax rate, although individual property owners could have seen their actual tax burden increase or decrease in correspondence with their new values.

The city is contracting with Vision Appraisal to conduct the revaluation. Cummings said the revaluation is expected to be complete by August 2019 and work should be starting any day. The contract is for $220,000.