Before reaching the merits, the
Board first addresses the Assessor’s claim that Mr. Lawrence did not timely
file his appeal at the local level. To appeal an assessment, a taxpayer must
file written notice with the township or county assessor who made the disputed
assessment no later than 45 days after being given notice of that assessment.
I.C. § 6-1.1-15-1 (a) – (b). The Assessor claims that Mr. Lawrence’s appeal was
untimely because he filed it more than 45 days after September 14, 2011—the
date that the Assessor testified he mailed out Form 11 notices for the 2011
assessment year. But the Assessor offered nothing to show that he actually
mailed a Form 11 for the subject property on that date. He introduced a copy of
a Form 11 for the subject property, but that document refers to the 2012
assessment year and lists September 14, 2012, as its mailing date. He did not
include a copy of the Form 11 for the property’s 2011 assessment.
Without more, the Assessor’s
testimony that he generally mailed Form 11 notices on September 14, 2011, does
not show that the subject property’s owner of record received notice on or near
that date. Granted, there is at least some evidence that the Assessor mailed a
document about the property’s assessment—Mr. Lawrence testified that there was
something in his mail when he returned from his honeymoon. But there is nothing
to show what date that document was mailed, much less that it was received
either by the property’s original owner or by Mr. Lawrence more than 45 days
before Mr. Lawrence filed his notice for review. The Board therefore rejects
the Assessor’s claim that Mr. Lawrence’s initial notice for review was untimely
and turns to the merits of his appeal.
Mr. Lawrence made a prima facie
case for reducing the subject property’s assessment. The Board reaches this
conclusion for the following reasons:
…
Mr. Lawrence offered a settlement
statement showing that he bought the subject property for $157,000 on October
10, 2011. He also offered an appraisal valuing the property at $159,000 as of
September 29, 2011. Both are sufficiently close to the March 1, 2011 valuation
date to be probative of the property’s true tax value. The Board gives the
purchase price slightly more weight. Thus, Mr. Lawrence made a prima facie case
that the assessment should be reduced to $157,000.
The Assessor offered no probative
valuation evidence of his own to rebut that sale price. He instead simply
described the procedures that he followed in computing assessments. But as the
Indiana Tax Court has explained, strictly applying assessment regulations does
not necessarily prove a property’s market value-in-use in an assessment appeal.
See Eckerling v. Wayne Twp. Assessor, 841 N.E.2d 674, 678 (Ind. Tax Ct.
2006) (holding that taxpayers failed to make a case by simply focusing on the
assessor’s methodology instead of offering market value-in-use evidence).
The Assessor also pointed to the
DLGF’s approval of his ratio study. But he offered no authority for using a
ratio study to prove an individual property’s market value-in-use. In fact, the
IAAO’s Standard on Ratio Studies, which 50 IAC 27-1-4 incorporates by
reference, prohibits using ratio studies for that purpose:
Assessors, appeal boards,
taxpayers, and taxing authorities can use ratio studies to evaluate the
fairness of funding distributions, the merits of class action claims, or the
degree of discrimination. . . . . However, ratio study statistics cannot be
used to judge the level of appraisal of an individual
parcel. Such
statistics can be used to adjust assessed values on appealed properties to the
common level.
INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF
ASSESSING OFFICIALS STANDARD ON RATIO STUDIES VERSION 17.03 Part 2.3 (Approved
by IAAO Executive Board 07/21/2007) (bold added, italics in original).
The Assessor also vaguely argued
that the subject property’s assessment was in line with the sale prices of
other properties in the same neighborhood. But he did not identify those
properties much less explain how their sale prices related to the subject
property’s market value-in-use. The Assessor therefore failed to rebut Mr.
Lawrence’s prima facie case for reducing the assessment.
