From the Lafayette Journal & Courier:
Taking five minutes to fill out a form could save homeowners big bucks in property taxes, but right now about 5,000 Tippecanoe County homeowners are at risk of losing their homestead deductions.
What’s called “the pink form” was sent out with property tax bill in 2010, 2011 and 2012. The form asks homeowners with the homestead deduction to verify that they still qualify for the deduction, according to the Indiana Department of Local Government Finance.
Homeowners are entitled to the deduction for their primary residence, but the state is trying to weed out instances where people have more than one homestead credit.
For homeowners who have not sent in the form to verify they qualify for the deduction, the deadline to do so is Dec. 31. But don’t panic.
“While this program is coming to an end at the end of this year, we will not be removing homesteads (deductions) without notification to taxpayers first,” Tippecanoe County Auditor Jennifer Weston said. “We will send a letter giving the opportunity to provide us with more information. ... We’re not just going to removing willy-nilly.”
There are 35,000 deductions applied to Tippecanoe County properties, Weston said. Of those, 24,000 have turned in their forms. Of the outstanding 11,000 deductions not yet accounted for, 5,000 are recent home purchases and do not need to fill out the form; 5,000 have not returned their forms and about 1,000 returned the forms but omitted some information so the auditor’s office is asking them for clarification.
The last thing Weston and her employees need is for homeowners to rush to her office to file out paperwork that they’ve already done.
“I don’t want 35,000 people now to say, ‘I don’t know if you got my pink form. I’m going to send another one,’ ” Weston said. “I don’t want start collecting forms on top of forms.
“If a taxpayer knows for sure that they have not sent theirs in, they may get online, get the form and send it in,” Weston said. “If they believe they completed a form but aren’t quite sure, then I would say wait for our correspondence.”
Homeowners do not want to ignore correspondence. The deduction lowers assessed value by $45,000, which significantly reduces tax liability. If the form is not on file or the auditor’s office correspondences are ignored, the auditor will eventually remove the deduction.
The state is making a push to cut down on duplicate homestead deductions by creating a database of who has what credits and deductions. Tippecanoe County, for example, has hired a firm, SRI, to cross-check deductions to make sure a homeowner is receiving a single deduction.
If homeowners receive a correspondence from SRI, they should respond to the questions and clear up any discrepancies either here or in another county, Weston said.
If someone is found to have had two deductions, they will be required to pay the additional taxes and a 10 percent civil penalty, Weston said.
http://www.jconline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2012312190032&nclick_check=1
