Roman Forest Online
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Roman Forest Online |
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Update: May 5, 2007 Most people by now probably have received May greetings from the Montgomery County Appraisal District. I'm still working on the numbers, but results don't look good for the community. Many residents last year had their appraisals increase by over 30%. For those of you unfamiliar with the property tax system, Texas law places a 10% homestead cap on appraisals -- a resident who had a 30% increase will have their assessed value go up 10% per year for three years until it reaches the full appraised value. Of course, in those three years the appraisal can continue to climb. Even small decreases in appraised value look good, but please don't be lulled into thinking that residents are getting a tax break. If your appraised value went up 45% last year but the value declined by 1% this year, you still have a 44% appraisal increase in the last two years! My advice: PROTEST! By paying on the assessed value, you are agreeing that your property is worth that amount. If you are intimidated by this process, there are professionals that will protest on your behalf and take a percentage of your savings. Here is a link to Ed Hendee's explanation of property appraisals and his form that will help organize your protest if you'd like to do it yourself. Below are 115 homes in Roman Forest. When averaging percentage increases and decreases in appraised value among these homes, there is a 11.6% INCREASE from 2006 to 2007. These figures do not represent the huge increases from 2005 to 2006. This chart is about 1/4th of the homes in Roman Forest, so I'll be adding more as I have time and adjusting this number as necessary. Data Obtained May 4th and 5th, 2007 from www.mcad-tx.org
Update: June 20, 2006 I've never been prouder of the citizens of Roman Forest. When residents file protests with the appraisal district a notice appears at the top of their account saying, "Property is under ARB review". I was discouraged in early June because not as many people had filed protests as I had hoped based on the number of properties that had that notice at the top of their account online. I was wrong (and never happier to be wrong!). The appraisal district must have finished putting in protest notices because what is reflected on their website is phenomenal. MANY of the properties I looked at today are protesting! There are some streets, such as Magnolia Bend, where the MAJORITY of people are protesting. There was one instance where I clicked on four properties in a row and ALL were protesting. On top of that good news, I personally know several Rominstas that went in before appointments were required to meet with appraisers and had their appraisal lowered that way. Roman Forest, you did good. Update: June 6, 2006 I'm working on an update on the numbers related to the appraisals in Roman Forest. Until today, the majority of my figures came from the preliminary appraisals put on the internet back in October. While most stayed the same on the Boulevard, some did change particularly on smaller streets like Venus and Chariot. What is now posted below is a smaller list, but is accurate as of June 6, 2006. The new list has the updated appraisals, and the changes from those of you who have already met with an MCAD appraiser. I am working to get other streets back on the list. As always, check with www.mcad-tx.org/records.htm for the most up-to-date information. Update: May 29, 2006 Good Memorial Day to everyone -- The East Montgomery County Observer just landed in my driveway. The article about Roman Forest appraisals is the top story, page 1, above the fold. Excellent job, Mr. Franco! Click on the small article to read:
"The
typical home being built today is not the same as it was back then,"
he said. "They are more expensive, the land is more expensive, the
construction costs are more expensive and the homes are selling for
more." --
Conroe Courier, 5/28/06 Update: May 24th, 2006 This is in today's Conroe Courier in a great article by Howard Roden: "Faced with the
possibility of issuing a 3-cent property tax increase, Montgomery County
officials admitted Monday they may have to do some significant
belt-tightening in the coming months when determining next year's
operating budget. And we here in Roman Forest wonder what happened to our appraisals... Update: May 23rd, 2006, 9:15 pm A second unofficial city meeting was held to discuss appraisal increases. Because of the short time frame citizens have to work within, Roministas are very limited in coming up with a collective solution to this year's radical appraisal increases. Councilman Loux spoke on the possibility of statewide, long range solutions -- appraisal caps, letters to our representatives, and statutory propositions. In Texas (unlike California's Proposition 13), citizens cannot get initiatives on the ballot. This must be done by our state representatives. Click on their names below to e-mail them your opinion on your latest appraisal. Click here to e-mail Representative John Otto Click here to e-mail Senator Tommy Williams Though the bill just signed by Governor Perry will help Roministas some, it fails to address the immediate issue. Professional tax protester Paula McLean spoke for the majority of the meeting taking questions from the audience. Here are some of her main points:
A resident raised his hand and pointed out that the New Caney Board of Education took away (or is planning to take away) the homestead exemption for school taxes (I could not verify this on the internet). He said we should be pressuring them to lower our rate. Mayor Jackson said that the city tax rate will not be increasing. A resident also said that we are working on a rule of seven -- if your taxes go up 10% every year for seven years, your tax bill has doubled. Everyone was encouraged to involve their neighbors that were not present at the meeting. A representative from the East Montgomery County was present. The meeting adjourned at about 8:30 pm. Update: May 17, 2006, 10:19 pm Click here for the handouts given by the appraisal district at the meeting A city meeting to discuss the appraisal situation was called by Mayor Floyd Jackson on May 17, 2006. The meeting was standing-room only with even more people in attendance than the meeting before Hurricane Rita. Mr. Dusty Rhodes and Mr. Mark Allen from the Montgomery County Appraisal District were present to answer questions from the crowd. Mr. Allen explained the process and stated that they were required by the state to fix appraisals at 100% of the market value. He says that his office uses home sales to drive this number. Allen claims that there were no sales gathered by his office for 2002, 2003, and 2004. There were 40 sales in Roman Forest last year, so he said his office was able to take those and adjust appraisal figures to stay at 95%-100% of market value (there are flaws to this system that the crowd pointed out). Mr. Rhodes explained that homes are ranked on a classification system, with older homes formerly being on a system different than newer ones. He said that some increases were homes being standardized on the same system. The appraisers said that a representative did come out and look at each individual home (although one contradicted himself later on in the meeting). By 7:55, the gentlemen took questions and comments from a heated audience. Points made by the audience: -- many of the new homes sold for an inflated value, not what they were really worth. A gentleman pointed the audience to the website www.zillow.com as a good tool for finding approximate market value. -- the discrepancy between older and newer homes in Roman Forest is extreme, and therefore appraisals cannot be equitable. The appraisers said that the older homes in Roman Forest were equal (if not better) than the new homes presently being built. One resident made the comparison that a 1970 car would not sell for the same amount as a 2006 model, and hence holding them up as equals was comparing apples and oranges. -- Mrs. Miller of Miller Homes cited specific examples of homes her husband built being appraised at $30,000 more than she sold them for last year. The appraisers claimed to have collected data on 40 home sales -- the Millers sold half of those homes so apparently the data the appraisal district is working on is incomplete (at best). -- All of the information the appraisal district has about your home (more than the data online) is available in the field room at the appraisal district in Conroe. No appointment necessary. -- A gentleman made the point that the state government is having to lower property taxes per order of the Texas Supreme Court. He (and many others, including myself) believe that the raised appraisal values in Montgomery County is an effort to offset the revenue the county will lose when property taxes are lowered this year. -- Many people told appraisal horror stories about how much their home has increased in the past two years. Several offered to sell to the county if they'd buy it at the appraised value. -- A resident who protested last year said that their county appraiser told them that because there were not many sales in Roman Forest the appraisal district had to use values from The Woodlands as comparisons. Areas such as The Woodlands have improved drainage, curbs, etc. -- After the appraisal district employees left, Mayor Jackson echoed the sentiments of most present -- that we were not satisfied with their answers. -- Several people suggested action as a community. Councilman Art Loux was suggested as a good person to get together a petition. A lady at the council meeting suggested Paula McLean as a person that could help us protest the new valuations. Ms. McLain is a former MCAD employee and has previous successes in contesting appraised values. Mayor Jackson is going to investigate the possibility of action as a city. People left their contact information so that the city could keep us informed of the latest developments. -- The meeting (angry mob) was dismissed at 8:30. Many people lingered to talk with their neighbors. This was a very intense meeting that served to reinforce my belief that most Roministas are highly dissatisfied with the appraisals! Please, please, please protest your taxes. What I took from this meeting was how subjective appraisals are. I hope to see you in Conroe. Please let me know if there is anything I can do to help! Original Editorial, pre-May 17th meeting: The Montgomery County Appraisal District is at it again. It was bad enough that in 2005, tax appraisals commonly soared 20-30%. Hey, I'm all for good schools and an adequate government, but a recent Houston Chronicle poll revealed that 58% of Houstonians felt that property taxes was the cost increase most affecting them financially. It's time for reform. My family challenged the 2005 appraisal and was able to have my appraisal lowered based on home condition. After all the paperwork was signed, the appraiser admitted that Roman Forest is a difficult area to appraise because houses of all different ages, types, and conditions are all next to each other. Sure, brand-new brick homes two miles down the road may sell for a quarter million, but those homes are nothing like mine -- although the fabulous homes down the road will certainly drive up appraisals for us all. Last year, the huge increases were not based on drive-by appraisals -- THEY WERE BASED ON PROPERTY SALES. During the mediation process, an appraiser told us that Roman Forest was due for drive-by appraisals in December of 2005. It is interesting that the new figures were posted in October 2005. The Texas Tax Code caps or limits increases in the appraised value of a residence for tax purposes to 10% annually when no improvements have been made to the property. In other words, the taxes of most Roministas will likely go up 10% per year, provided the tax rate doesn't change. At this rate, many Roman Foresters could be taxed out of their homes! I challenge all of my neighbors here in Roman Forest to let 2006 be the year they rise up against appraisal creep. Please call ( 281-703-5022) or e-mail me for information about how I successfully challenged my appraisal last year. It costs you nothing to protest, and the worst they can tell you is, "no".Below is the MCAD listing for my house, and many houses in my neighborhood. All of this information can be obtained at Montgomery County Appraisal District Webpage. If you feel these increases are wrong, please go to the Clout Texas webpage and join. Conroe Underground is also a good place to get more information about the taxes locally.
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