GHI Members Finding Errors in Assessment Invoices

For the first time, the 1,648 individual properties of Greenbelt Homes, Incorporated (GHI) have been individually assessed, and some residents don’t like what they see in their invoices—mistakes they fear could impact their real estate tax bills.

For example, eight homes on court 2 of Gardenway Road are described in the invoices as frames. All 18 homes in that court are brick.

“There appear to be many, many inconsistencies like that,” said Andy Carruthers, the GHI member who began an online discussion on Greenbelters Yahoo group about the invoices, which are viewable on the Maryland Department of Assessments and Taxations (SDAT) website. Since initiating the forum, Carruthers said he received messages from fellow GHI members with similar concerns.

Joe Hensley, the county assessment supervisor for SDAT, which is responsible for the assessments, said any mistakes in the invoices are news to him. If there are, he said it’s possible information for one unit was switched for another unit.

“There might have been a brick account put on a frame unit and vice versa, but with 1,600 accounts I’m not sure how we are going to be able to verify that,” Hensley said.

Unit type descriptions are based on information that’s long been in the SDAT system, said Hensley’s assistant, Dan Puma. “I like to think the data in there is pretty good,” he said. There’s a chance it was wrong from the beginning, but he said he’s skeptical. “There aren’t too many things we should be missing out there,” Puma said.

Also on the invoices are home assessments, from which real estate taxes are derived. According to Robert Schwab, professor of economics at the University of Maryland, characteristics like exterior make-up are used to calculate home assessment.

“It’s based largely on information on recent sales of comparable properties, and that’s always the main source of information for assessments,” Schwab said.

Evaluating the worth of a home is part science, part art, he said. The house is compared to others with similar features—exterior, size, additions, and so on—Schwab said. “The trick is to try and relate the sales prices of the homes to these various characteristics ... Once you’ve done that, you have some notion of how you’d evaluate those homes,” Schwab said.

Until last year, the 1,600 individual units and the 46 other GHI properties were grouped into approximately 76 invoices, Hensley said. For the first time in 2012, members will pay taxes according to their individually assessed homes, SDAT and GHI officers explained. In order for the units to be assessed, those chunks had to be divided into 1,646 invoices, they said.

Hensley said it’s possible errors occurred when groups of GHI property were broken down for individual assessment. “If it’s just a question of reversing the models ... the total [GHI tax bill] may not change,” Hensley said.

But that might not be good enough. “I’m concerned about fairness and accuracy for the community,” Carruthers said.

Hensley said he doesn’t expect individual GHI member tax bills to be impacted much by such mistakes.

Former GHI treasurer, Sylvia Lewis, said she doesn’t think members will see an immediate impact on their tax bills from the errors—as long as they apply for the Homestead Tax Credit, and Hensley agreed that the credit would make a difference.

Any homeowner—or occupancy right holder, in the case of GHI—who qualifies for the credit are protected against increases of more than 10 percent in taxable assessment, according to the SDAT website. This implicitly puts a cap on how drastically a homeowner’s real estate tax can increase between two years, Schwab said.

SDAT hasn’t visited GHI property in four or five years, Puma said. “We just didn’t have the capability of walking around every unit every year,” Puma said. Such field research is also used to assess additions and improvements to units, if the changes reach a certain dollar amount, Puma said. “If it’s an 8-by-8 shed, we aren’t going to assess that,” he said.

The invoices also list “property land area,” which many on the Greenbelters forum mistook for inaccurate measurements of their yard sizes. It appeared especially suspect, for example, that every home at 2 Gardenway had a property land area of 4,200 square feet.

But property land area does not refer to yard space, Puma explained. When the invoices were divided to accommodate individual assessments, the common area was split evenly among members, he said.

Even if property land area did refer to yard space, it does not impact the assessed value, Puma said.

Aside from the information SDAT already had for the invoices, Puma said the department received transfer share information from GHI. SDAT also looked at copies of building permits, Hensley said.

Hensley and Puma both recommended that members who find mistakes in their invoices should contact GHI so that a comprehensive list can be passed on to SDAT. “If it’s wrong, we’ll correct it,” Hensley said.

“We would certainly be willing to do that,” the GHI General Manager Gretchen Overdurff said. The management office has not received any complaints directly from members and was only aware of the issues through the Greenbelters Yahoo group.

Perhaps when members see their tax bills in July, though, they’ll have nothing to complain about. The owner of a higher quality brick home that is being assessed as a frame home might actually be catching a break, Schwab said.