Subjective Valuations

Did your property assessment go down this year? Perhaps you are one of the very rare Nebraskans who by chance received an equivalent valuation as last year or even a slight reduction. Once again, this year's valuation notices aptly demonstrate how broken our tax system is.

The process of valuating properties in Nebraska is completely subjective. There simply is no uniform, objective methodology for valuating properties. County assessors determine the value of properties as they see fit, and this is a dirty little secret that they never want the public to know about. There are numerous examples I can cite which demonstrate how valuations are subjectively determined, but today I will share three examples.

First, the methodology is not transparent. One particular woman I know in Lancaster County did her homework extensively to protest the valuation of her home. However, she was denied on the basis that her work did not conform to the assessor's manual. So, she pressed her county commissioners and the county assessors with bulldog tenacity to see the manual. They refused to give her the information she needed to make the comparison.

Second, some county assessors make use of fuzzy math. Knox County is a good example. The county assessors in Knox County value grassland, dryland cropland, and irrigated cropland with different percentages across three different market areas within the county. However, when the math is done, their averages for this year do not match the percentages they claimed for these three different classes of agricultural lands in these three market areas.

Third, county assessors may use any method they want. County assessors have at their discretion several options in determining the value of properties. Nebraska state statutes allow assessors to determine which sales should be included in an array when valuing a particular property. However, they are not required to include 1031 tax exchange sales, and they are not required to use sales between neighboring landowners when a sale is done between two neighbors. They are also not required to assess home site acreages at a certain percentage.  As a result, county assessors may use these questionable tactics to drive up the price of everybody's property, and that makes the entire process subjective and broken. So, this year I say, "Thank you," to all of the county assessors for making the people aware of how subjective and broken our tax system really is.

In Morrill County, where I live, my valuation went up 42 percent this year. That increase was mostly due to an effort to raise the value of rural residential properties. When I inquired about this, I was told by my assessor that the standard procedure was to assume that 15 to 20 percent of the property is land, but according to the Nebraska Property Assessment Division, assessors may use any percentage they want!

If you have never protested the valuation of your property, this is the year to do so. There is no filing fee. Instructions for filing a protest and Form 422 can be found online at the Nebraska Department of Revenue's website at https://revenue.nebraska.gov. Form 422 must be delivered to the county clerk in person or mailed with a postmark no later than June 30, 2024.

It is time for the property owners of Nebraska to revolt. Protesting your valuation is the most cost-effective way of leading this kind of rebellion. Every county assessor needs to be tied up well into August with hearings on these valuation protests. Just as a cord of many strands is not so easily broken, a rebellion by many property owners will not go unheard. The time has come to abandon Nebraska's broken tax system and replace it with the EPIC Option Consumption Tax whereby eliminating all county assessors. Please visit our website at http://www.epicoption.org.