What Is A Home Value Assessment?

August 28, 2009

What You Need to Know About Home Value Assessments

When trying to determine the current value of your home, there are a lot of similar sounding terms that are thrown around to help you do that. One of the most commonly confused terms is “home value assessment”. The reason for this is that it’s easily interchangeable with the term “home value appraisal”, but you might be surprised to find that there is actually a significant difference between the two.

A home appraisal is an optional service in which you pay a third party Apprasier to evaluate your home and determine the current home value. This is generally done by people looking to sell their home, get a home equity loan or those wanting to refinance their current mortgage.

A home value assessment on the other hand, is generally used to describe the process in which a local county official will assess the current condition of your home in order to determine the amount of property taxes you should pay. Therefore, it traditionally is associated with less appeal than an appraisal.

A home assessment represents a typical, or average value for a property in relation to other property values within a specific period of time. Depending on where you live, this time frame can vary from six months to two years! It is not usually associated with the current trends in the real estate market because the value of a particular property will depend on the sales of the other homes nearby . Assessments are NOT based on larger sales activity trends which you might see county-wide or within a zip code area.

Instead your assessment value will be based on typical values within your neighborhood. While the sale of a property will affect a home’s assessment, the effect will be diluted by the mass appraisal methods and results usually from within the past year. Consequently, this time lag means that the assessments of properties that have sold very recently may differ from the sale price which is generally based on appraised value and real estate market trends.

It’s also important to note that transitory elements such as neighbors who don’t mow their lawns, or are  consistantly noisy, will not affect your assessment. Whereas things like house construction, neighborhood boundaries and lot size remain relatively constant and therefore will likely play a factor in your home’s assessment.

Quick Facts

• An assessment is when the local government assesses your home value in order to determine how much property tax you should pay.

• Most government agencies do home assessments every 2-4 years, but can vary based on location.

• Home assessments are based on smaller, local areas such as your neighborhood versus larger trend tracking boundaries like counties and zip codes.

• An appraisal can be can be done by an actual Apprasier for a fee of  or by your local Realtor, usually free of charge!

• If you feel you’ve received an unfair assessment of your home, you can contact your local tax officials and contest any findings.

In the end, it’s good to know the major difference between home value assessments and home appraisals. And while there’s not a whole lot you can do to affect your home assessment, it is important to be prepared for any changes that may take place. Taxes: Just one of the many joys and responsibilities of home ownership!