BY CLARA VAUGHN, Eastern Shore Post —
Accomack County homeowners are likely to see their property assessments rise this year.
“Overall, the assessed values that we have on the books are approximately 79% of the fair-market value of those properties,” said County Administrator Mike Mason during a presentation last month on the county’s biennial assessment.
“These are not results that put those values where we’re required to be,” he said in the update to the Accomack Board of Supervisors.
County code requires properties be reassessed every two years. The Accomack Department of Assessment examined around 2,200 home sales between 2022 and 2023, broken down into 14 neighborhoods and 19 tax districts, in its most recent assessment, Mason said.
The results show homes in Accomack were assessed an average of 21% below fair-market value, which is determined using comparable sales data.
While the average increase in assessed property values needs to be 21% to reach the state-required fair-market value, the increases will not be uniform across all properties, Mason added.
Virginia’s constitution and state code set several consequences if a county fails to assess properties at 100% of their fair-market value, County Attorney Jan Proctor said.
Those include withholding the local share of the ABC tax and lowering taxes the county receives from properties such as public utilities, she said.
“That can be a hit in the monetary department,” she said.
The local governing body — the Accomack County Board of Supervisors — “has absolutely no power to adjust the real estate assessments,” Proctor added.
“You can lower the tax rate, but you cannot change the assessments,” she said.
Accomack will notify homeowners of the assessment results and hold public hearings before making any changes, Mason said. He added there will be an appeal process homeowners can follow.
