Mr. Hughes primarily focused on
adjusting the $235,000 that he paid for the subject property in February 2008
to a value as of March 1, 2010. To do so, he relied on indexes that he
downloaded from the FHFA’s website. According to Mr. Hughes those indexes show
a decline of almost 11% in the Fort Wayne housing market between the first
quarter of 2008 and the first quarter of 2010 and much larger declines in
regional and national markets. Mr. Hughes arrived at his conclusions by simply
adding the index numbers for each quarter to get a cumulative level of
depreciation. But it is not clear that the indexes were designed to be read
that way. In fact, Mr. Hughes offered no evidence about how the indexes are
meant to be read or about the data on which the indexes are based. Also, most
of the indexes that Mr. Hughes offered measure market depreciation in broad
geographical areas. They say little about the real estate market at issue in
this appeal. The index for Fort Wayne is more targeted, but it is still
imprecise.
...
Mr. Hughes asks the Board to
decide that his property depreciated by roughly 11% instead of by 4.3%,
representing a total of less than $15,000. Without more information about how
to read the FHFA’s indexes or about the data on which those indexes are based,
Mr. Hughes’s evidence does not allow the Board to draw a distinction that fine.
…
Because Mr. Hughes did not
offer any probative evidence to dispute the subject property’s assessment, he
failed to make a prima facie case.
