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and high rates of over-assessment, meaning that included in the overall assessment, including
more companies should be taking advantage building materials, structural elements, and
of the appeals process. But data also suggest design, along with a massive assortment of
that securing expert help can make a significant others. Knowing the heuristics that assessors
impact on the amount of savings recovered per in particular settings begin with when making
appeal . Our goal is to demystify the property judgments on commercial properties may be a
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tax expense and the process of addressing it, to key to countering an assessment with a more
encourage businesses to alter their assumptions reasonable one of your own.
toward the reality.
Similarly, rates themselves may be applied
A Complicated Process based on (potentially erroneous) classification
of the building’s use, depending on municipal,
The first step a company must take in empowering county, and state tax codes. And certain
itself to find savings in its property taxes is to industries might have property included in their
approach the tax itself as a variable rather than valuations, and thus their rates, that might better
a simple, straightforward rate or number. What be considered intangible rather than tangible
appears on a property tax bill is not merely a assets. Understanding assessments at this level
percentage of a property’s assessed value. provides a significant foundation for protesting
Both the value and the rate itself are processes, assessed value and reducing taxes.
not principles. An assessor, for example, may
operate with any combination of a few primary To fully understand all of this variation, consider
guidelines. They might primarily calculate based the circumstances involved: property taxes are
on what properties of a similar class, use, or frequently a local government’s predominant
scale can be expected to sell for under normal source of funding, and states are increasingly
selling conditions. Alternatively, the assessor involved in creating laws that enact uniform
might develop an assessment based on what it procedures for assessing, collecting, and
would cost to replace the property in question adjudicating property taxes . Local and state
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within current market conditions. In either case, governments have a stake in ensuring a regular
a litany of idiosyncratic dimensions particular source of stable property tax income, often
to municipalities, counties, or states might be projecting budgets based on net assessments.

1 Doerner, William M., and Keith R. Ihlanfeldt. 2014. An empirical analysis of the property tax appeals process. Journal of Property Tax
Assessment & Administration 11 (4): 5.
2 National Conference of State Legislators, 2015. Property Taxation on Communications Providers: A Primer for State Legislatures.
Whitepaper, Executive Committee Task Force on State and Local Legislation. http://www.ncsl.org.

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