The Village completed a town wide reassessment of the property values in 2011 and those results will be utilized for the 2012 tax billing. The reassessment was necessary due to the overall decline in the real estate market in the past few years, which resulted in a large number of tax appeals. The effect of the tax appeals is to increase the burden on those property owners who did not appeal. The reassessment readjusts and fairly apportions the tax burden among all residents.

Overall, the total value of all properties in the Village decreased by approximately 19.2%. Each property owner was mailed a notice of their new assessed value which will be used for purposes of the 2012 tax bills. Each property was individually evaluated by the appraisal firm and not every property decreased by 19.2%. The results of the reassessment of each individual property will directly affect the taxes on that property. If your property declined in value by more than the average 19.2% decrease, then your value is a smaller piece of the overall value and your taxes would decrease solely as a result of the reassessment. If you were fortunate and your property lost less value than the average 19.2% decline, then your value is a slightly larger share of the total value and your taxes would increase solely as a result of the reassessment.

In order to permit our residents to evaluate the impact of the reassessment on their taxes, we have prepared a calculator, whereby you can input your 2011 and 2012 assessed values and see what the municipal portion of your taxes would be under each assessment based on the same 2011 tax levy. To open the calculator click here. Note that you will need to have Microsoft Excel or compatible software to use the calculator and have available your 2011 and new 2012 assessed property values. The results of the calculator will provide you with an indication of the impact of the reassessment on your taxes. A similar impact would occur on the school and county taxes, but the dollar amount is less clear and not susceptible to easy calculation. This is because in each case South Orange’s share of the school and county overall values, and thus South Orange’s share of the school and county budgets, will be less than in 2011, as a result of our overall decreased value.

Please note that this calculator simply provides you with an indication of the impact of the reassessment of your individual property on your municipal taxes. If the tax impact result reflected at the bottom of the calculator is negative or a decrease, it means that your assessed value declined by more than the average decrease. If the result is positive or an increase, it means that your assessed value declined by less than the average decrease, meaning that your property retained more of its value than the average.

Please also be aware that in each case the calculator utilizes the same 2011 municipal tax levy amount in order to isolate the impact of the reassessment. This indicates what your 2011 municipal taxes would have been under your old and new reassessed values. Your actual 2012 municipal, school and county taxes will also be affected by any budget tax levy increases, independent of the effect of the reassessment. The Village’s 2012 municipal budget was introduced on April 9th and reflects a 1.79% increase in the tax levy. However, the 2011 and 2012 tax rates cannot be compared due to the reassessment. A public hearing on the 2012 municipal budget is scheduled for Monday, May 14, 2012 at 7:30 p.m.

For more information on South Orange Village property revaluation click here.