WHEN CAN I FILE AND WHERE DO I GET A FORM?

Applications for property tax abatements are available at the Assessor’s Office or online in the link below.  They can be filed any time from the time the third quarter bill is sent out  (late December) to the time it is due (usually February 1).  This is approximately a 30-day period and includes the entire month of January.  Any abatement applications filed after the date taxes are due in the Treasurer’s office cannot by law be considered by the Assessor’s Office.   Therefore, timeliness is of utmost importance.

WHAT ARE THE CRITERIA FOR FILING FOR AN ABATEMENT?

Abatement applications can be filed by those individuals who believe that their property assessment is higher than the price for which the house could be sold on January 1, 2007 or that there is a mistake on their property record card which affects the value of the house by overstating its value.  Abatements cannot be granted for any reason unrelated to the value of the house.  The business of the Assessor’s Office is to allocate the tax levy equitably to property owners.  It is not involved in any way with formation of the budget.

WHAT SHOULD BE INCLUDED WITH THE ABATEMENT APPLICATION?

Your abatement application should be as specific as possible as to why you feel your assessment is too high.  Assessments everywhere in Massachusetts are determined by a careful analysis of sales that have taken place in the community.  After such an analysis by the Assessors has been completed and new values determined, both the sales and the new values are reviewed by the Department of Revenue.  The purpose of this review is to assure that the sales model developed by the Assessors accurately reflects the sales and has been applied consistently throughout the city.  To defend your position, therefore, you too should cite actual sales of comparable properties that took place in calendar year 2006 to prove that your assessment is too high.  It is the 2006 sales that are used as the basis for the 2008 assessments.  Sales from calendar year 2007 will be used next year for the FY 2009 assessments and cannot be used to support a reduction of your FY 2008 assessment.  There are booklets you can use in the Assessor’s Office with all the arms-length property sales from 2006 that were used in the general analysis. You should also review your property record card for accuracy.  You can get a copy of your record card at the Assessor’s office or check the data on the Melrose web site at “cityofmelrose.org”.  It is important that the data on the record card be accurate because this data is used to determine the value of your property.  Some of the data is purely descriptive and does not affect value whereas other data does affect value.  An example of an error that would affect value would be if the record card indicated that the house had a finished basement that in fact did not exist.  An example of an error that would not affect value would be if the record card indicated that there were 7 rooms and 4 bedrooms in the house when, in fact, there are only 6 rooms and 3 bedrooms.  If you encounter such an error, it should be corrected but there would be no value change.

WHAT HAPPENS AFTER I FILE?

Each application for an abatement is reviewed by the Board of Assessors.  The first step typically is for the Assessor to schedule an inspection of the property to determine whether the data on the property record card is correct.  Any discrepancies will be noted.  Then the sales of the most similar properties will be reviewed and particular attention will be given to the sales cited by the applicant.  The Board of Assessors must render a decision on the abatement request within 90 days of the date of application and transmit that decision to the applicant within 10 days of the decision.  After the decision has been made, if the applicant continues to believe that the assessment is higher than the market value of the property as of January 1, 2007, he can file a petition with the Appellate Tax Board.  They will hear arguments from both sides and render a final decision.