Property assessments up slightly for 2018
The value of Nova Scotia properties has increased but at a slower rate than in previous years.
Property Valuation Services Corporation, the assessment authority for the province, mailed more than 600,000 property owners their annual assessment notice on Monday.
The total assessment for 2018 is $106,641,493,300, up 1.29 per cent from the 2017 total assessment. That breaks down to $ 82,723,454,200 in residential assessment for 2018, up 1.52 per cent from 2017. The total residential property assessment after the annual cap is taken into account is $74,819,827,700, a 2.26-per-cent increase from the year before.
The commercial assessment for 2018 is $23,918,039,100, a 0.49-per cent-hike from 2017.
The percentage changes across the board are lower than the changes from 2016 to 2017.
“Don’t forget that the values being published today reflect a base day of Jan. 1, 2017, and so that’s the snapshot in time represented by the base date ... on the values that are on people’s assessment notices today,” said Carlos Resendes, vice-president of business innovation with Property Valuation Services.
“It would be the conditions present at that point in time.”
Assessments play a huge role in determining how much property tax Nova Scotians pay. Municipalities determine a tax rate and taxes payable are calculated by applying the rate to the assessed value of the property.
Resendes said fluctuating borrowing and mortgage rates are part of the equation when it comes to buying a property.
“It’s hard to tell how fiscal policy and mortgage rate changes or mortgage policy changes will affect any given market,” he said. “It’s certainly a consideration for people when they buy homes. We would analyze the actual sales data and then determine what the value is for these properties. Those things are all part and parcel of what those sales numbers are telling us, so they are incorporated. Those purchasing decisions and considerations are all reflected in the final amount that people pay. The advantage of us having a retrospective look at the market to determine the values for assessment purposes is that we get to measure rather than predict what the market is going to do.”
In the years from 2009 to 2015, the increases topped three per cent for residential, commercial and total assessments. In 2009, the total assessment increase was 8.6 per cent.
“The percentage increases year over year from the total assessment roll, from the residential sector and the commercial sector dropped over the last 10 years for sure, provincially and in Halifax as well. I’ll leave it to economists to tell us what the reasons are for that.
“Our mandate is to analyze the sales that actually occurred and come up with a value.”
Property owners can view details about their assessment by visiting www.pvsc.ca.
Property owners who wish to appeal their assessment to Property Valuation Services have until midnight, Feb. 15, to file.
Resendes said Property Valuation Services representatives and assessors are available to answer questions or discuss an assessment at 1-800-380-7775 from 8:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Monday through Friday.
“We encourage people to call us first. We have an internal call centre that is staffed with our own staff ... who are able to talk intelligently about the value of a property for any person who calls. Nine times out of 10 that resolves the issue. We encourage people not to just go ahead and appeal but to give us a call and maybe we can share some information and clarify some particular point or question that they may have.”
The province’s assessment cap program came into effect in 2005, with the goal of protecting Nova Scotians from sudden and dramatic increases in property assessments.
In 2007, the program was revised and expanded to cover more properties.
The capped prescribed rate was also changed in 2007 from a constant rate of 10 per cent to a fluctuating rate set by the increase in the Nova Scotia Consumer Price Index.