DOBSON — Surry County government may value homes higher when calculating taxes next summer, but that doesn’t necessarily mean homeowners will pay more.
Penny Harrison, county tax administrator, told the Surry County Board of Commissioners Monday night that the value of property across commercial and residential holdings alike is up about 7% over the last valuation in 2016.
Roger Bedsaul, appraisal supervisor, said the value has climbed more than that for residential, while commercial property has risen slower than 7%.
This could lead residents to thinking their annual property taxes will go up July 1 with the new fiscal year, but the county board will take this into consideration next spring during budget workshops before voting on a tax rate in June.
This issue goes back to 2017 when Harrison was still the interim tax administrator. She said that while the county had only recently completed a revaluation, it would be a good idea to plan out when to do the next one.
She gave reasons why it would be wise to put off enacting new tax values in 2020 to 2021.
The last time revaluations were done, property values had dipped from the previous cycle, the commissioners pointed out at the time in 2016.
Commissioner Eddie Harris said those lower values ended up costing the county about $342,000 in lost tax revenue per year. With property values and the housing market in better shape now, it is reasonable to think that the revaluations would bump things right back up to the revenue level it was before, if not a little more, he believed.
That could put more tax burden on the taxpayers, he said, so putting off the revaluation a year would give folks another year to get by at a lower rate.
At the August meeting, Harrison came before the county board to give an update on tax collections for the 2019-20 year — which hit 98.61%.
Commissioner Eddie Harris took the opportunity to ask how the revaluation was going.
Harrison said that much of the county had been completed, with the Elkin area and a few commercial locations still to go. She said it was important to talk about this issue early, rather than wait until the board’s annual budget retreat in February (which usually kicks off the budget preparation cycle).
This week
At this week’s meeting, Harrison appeared before the commissioners to hold a public hearing on how the county calculates its new residential and commercial tax values.
Those wondering how the county calculated these values can see the complex appraisal manual/schedule of values online at https://bit.ly/360f4HK.
With no one in person or speaking up via video feed, the commissioners closed the public hearing and voted in favor of the method used by the appraisal office.
County Manager Chris Knopf asked Harrison what the results were showing so far.
After she brought up the 7% increase, she let Bedsaul come up to the podium to give further information.
Where is most of this increase coming from, commercial or residential, asked Commissioner Harris.
“Mostly in single-family residential,” said Bedsaul. Some of the houses that one might buy to fix up and flip were going for $80-$90 per square foot, but now the housing market has them selling for $110 per square foot.
What about new construction, asked Harris.
That is all over the place, he answered. Modular homes could even be $110 now. The price can vary from $175 to $200 for a custom-built home, so there is a big range for that.
Is this change happening in certain areas of the county, asked Harris.
For single-family residential, it is increasing in every area, Bedsaul replied. There is a scarcity of local housing under $150,000. The listings the appraisal office has seen, the real estate offices have received multiple offers in a week oftentimes, sometimes within days.
As for commercial, he said the office has seen smaller increases. Rockford Street in Mount Airy is one area of growth. There is growth in senior living facilities, too.
Harris said it is promising that property values are doing so well in the county.
Next budget
Commissioner Harris is the longest serving board member now.
He said that since he was first elected, it has always been the board’s policy to adopt a “revenue-neutral adjustment” to the tax rate when dealing with revaluations.
In any revaluation, some areas may raise more than others, whether that is in commercial or personal property, he said Tuesday. He said it would be his expectation the board would adopt that neutral policy at the culmination of this revaluation.
Commercial value hasn’t accelerated at the rate that residential has, he noted, and the board will have to take all of that into account next year when working toward a new 2021-22 fiscal budget.
“Obviously the big concern is residential valuation,” he said. “At the end of the day, the average homeowner’s bill should be fairly flat. The caveat is that this is a board decision, and I’m just one board member.”
While COVID-19 has made for uncertain times in nearly every facet of life, Harris pointed out that the board learned Monday night that sales tax revenues in rural counties like Surry, Yadkin and Alleghany have actually been up from March to June (the latest month available). Sales are down in the urban counties, which might be because folks aren’t driving to Winston-Salem and Greensboro to do their shopping. And that has helped keep sales tax dollars local.
Chairman Larry Johnson said the tax rate will be one of the issues up for discussion at the annual retreat in February and during the budget cycle in the spring.
While he wasn’t on the board like Harris was at the time, Johnson said looking at the county’s financials that it shows the board did make a tax rate change during the recession in 2008.
The county had performed a revaluation during 2007, which showed property values had gone up and would go into effect in July 2008. However, that came as the economy was taking a hit across the country.
Rather than keep the tax rate at 63¢ per $100 of valued property, the board voted to drop the rate to 58.2¢ at that time.
Johnson said he can’t say anything now about what might happen with the tax rate as those talks will take place over a period of months.
Source: https://www.mtairynews.com
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