Lake Arrowhead

If you are planning to sell, the decreased evaluation may not be helpful. One guy told me he had a bank give him a hard time when he was selling a house in the 90s. The first buyer was turned down for the amount of the loan. So he had the tax assessor reappraise at the higher amount, then the next buyer was able to get the loan for the amount because it was justified by a more recent appraisal (the original assessment was on the purchase which was over 5 yrs old).

Basically this took away the ability for the bank to use the assessed value to turn down the loan.

We had our home reassessed by an independent appraiser [with impeccable credentials] when we wanted to refi back in the late 80's. The purchase price was 420K and the bank accepted the appraiser's valuation of 680K, even though the assessors value at the time was just below 500K.

When we had lender give us a loan on the Tiny Cabin in 04, they sent out an appraisal company from Orange County to look at the place. The appraiser told me that he was going to look up recent sales to help him come up with his appraisal. The county's assessment was from 6 years previous and was something like $59,000. Obviously times had changed a bit in the real estate market.

That's why the assessor's amount can really only be used for taxes; it doesn't necessarily reflect market conditions. Who knows, after all these reassessments the market may go up again.

I just was on the county assessors website http://www.sbcounty.gov/assessor/TaxpayerScams.asp

Apparently there is a scam going around regarding lowered property taxes. There is a link on the website as to where to go to get your property reassessed that is truly through the county but there are examples of the scam letters that we should be aware of...FYI