"We, the Sheeple"

For me, like many other people I’m sure, the impact of the almost 18% reassessment increase mentioned above wasn’t realized immediately.  The notice of reassessment comes in late April/early May, and there’s nothing that needs to be done or paid at that time.  In fact, the amount you will eventually have to pay isn’t even included on the front of the notice.  You have to look for it, on the back, in very tiny print, at the bottom of a bunch of other numbers.  Whatever, I’m not expecting the County Assessor’s office to hand-hold people through their adult responsibilities.  But being a long-experienced I.T. person, I can tell you that including the tax liability amount on the front of the document would cost them absolutely nothing.  And there’s plenty of space for it.  So maybe there’s some other reason they don’t put it on the front….?

Also, the impact of the increase is rather obscure when your bank pays the tax bill every year from mortgage escrow, and the change in the payment is spread out over a year’s time and blurred with changes in home-owner insurance rates, interest rates, processing fees, etc.  Do you even know right now how much your tax bill was last year?  I didn’t.

Of course, it’s also easy to be apathetic and believe you won’t win when it comes to taxes and government, so there’s no point wasting the time and effort trying to fight it, right?  And then there’s all those intimidating terms and antics used by the County Assessor’s office that could scare away even the bravest of souls.

And lastly, there’s the misplaced sense of excitement or pride in thinking your property value has increased significantly, especially if that increase happened when you did little more than squat on your property for the last two years.  The problem is, the amount at which the County Assessor’s office values your property has nothing to do with what your property is actually worth.  No one is offering to purchase your property at that price, and there’s no guarantee you could get that amount if you tried to sell it.  And for me, that’s really unfortunate.  Because if I could have made the County Assessor’s office purchase my house for what they said it was worth, I would have cashed the check and been out of the house by the weekend.  Then I would have sat across the street on my neighbor’s deck with an expensive, celebratory glass of wine and laughed as I watched them try to figure out how in the world they were going to get their investment back out of the money-pit that they had just purchased!

Since that wasn’t an option, I started pursuing what my options were.  I’ve learned A LOT in the last year, and what I’ve learned is surprising, almost unbelievable.  I wrote this article to share that information with other St. Louis County property owners.

Because there IS something you can do to fight back.