Officials Look to Placate Homeowners on Inaccurate Assessments

Selling a home in Port Chester isn't easy in today's economy. Just ask Frank Troha.

The Port Chester man owns a condo in the historic Lifesavers building on Main Street. Vision Appraisal, the firm that handles assessments for the village, says Troha's condo is worth $265,000. But the highest offer Troha has received from potential buyers this year is $180,000.

Troha isn't alone among local homeowners who are scratching their heads at assessment values in Port Chester and the wider Town of Rye. Leaders in Port Chester, Rye and Rye Brook have been hearing similar complaints from their constituents, and after a Rye Brook trustee questioned the accuracy of assessments made by Vision Appraisal, a special meeting has been scheduled for Monday night. At the meeting, homeowners will be able to air their grievances to Vision Appraisal President Dave Arnold and local politicians.

The meeting will allow frustrated homeowners to get some answers on how values are calculated and how the appeals process is handled when homeowners feel their properties aren't accurately assessed. Troha said he went to a hearing to appeal his assessment and 30 days later "received a cryptic letter from them saying there would be no change. No explanation whatsoever was given."

"In my condo building, havoc has been created by Vision Appraisals because they visited no condos in person -- rendering the word "Vision" in their title ironic if not outright deceptive -- yet increased the value of some while decreasing the value of others," Troha said. "Some of the condos that went down in value actually had major renovations that should have increased their appraised value, while some of the condos that went up in value had no renovations and had fallen into disrepair."

Homeowners say it's unfair for assessors to peg a value to their property without even having a look inside. But that's common practice, and often assessors don't see the inside of homes until the homeowner cries foul and goes through an appeals process.

"The assessor makes assumptions about the interior condition based on what he or she can observe on the exterior," said Port Chester Mayor Dennis Pilla. "If a property has a built-in pool, paved driveways and a well-manicured lawn, the assessor will assume that the inside is also in pristine condition."

Oftentimes, that's not the case. Outdoor maintenance varies widely from home to home, even in Westchester's famously leafy suburbs. In some cases, cobblestone driveways and elaborate landscaping are the modifications of previous owners -- just ask homeowners on Quintard Drive, who shake their heads at the tacky fountain a neighbor had installed in their tiny front yard before packing up and leaving town.

And even if a homeowner intends to make the same investment in the interior of their home, projects can be stalled due to economic hardship or the direction of the real estate market, and what's inside a home isn't always reflective of how the outside looks.

Pilla acknowledged there are flaws in the system that need to be worked out, and said the village has made strides toward more accurate data by changing the way homes are grouped and flagging statistical outliers so they don't throw off the values of homes in an entire neighborhood.

One example: A North King Street home that has a built-in pool and a putting green on its 1.5-acre property. The home sold for $1.5 million in 2007, a 30 percent increase since the last time the home changed hands. Because homes are not only grouped by neighborhood, but by type (colonial, ranch, condo, etc.), such a sale could throw off assessment values for similarly-categorized homes nearby.

Now, those homes are flagged in the Rye assessor's database and weighted differently to protect neighbors from suddenly eye-popping tax bills. Such wide swings in value are the primary complaints when local homeowners contact village hall, Pilla said.

"Most of the comments come [are from homeowners] who say their tax bill is very high, so that makes them very conscious of what drives that bill," Pilla said. "They say, 'I see the value of my house and it seems high compared to a recent sale in the neighborhood, or it's valued high because of a recent sale.'"

Last year, more than 1,000 homeowners in Rye Brook and Rye, complaining that the values were not accurate and did not reflect the reality of the real estate market. In some cases, homeowners said assessments were off the mark by $1 million or more.

Other towns and cities face the same challenges and the same complaints from homeowners, and complaints abound about Vision Appraisal and municipal oversight of property assessments. As local leaders look to reconcile assessments with the reality of the real estate market, for people like Troha, relief can't come too soon.

"My current realtor got a big laugh out of this discrepancy, saying I should be very glad to get $200,000," Troha said of his condo in the Lifesavers building. "But I'm not laughing. ... Something very unfair is going on here."

The special meeting on assessments is scheduled for Monday at 7:30 p.m. on the third floor of the town courthouse at 10 Pearl Street in Port Chester.

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