unfinished bldgs are untaxable??

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The previous owners of our property built a pole bldg right before they left. Last year our taxes went up b/c the county finally figured out that a new bldg had been built. In bemoaning the new tax bill (it's not really THAT bad!) to a friend, he mentioned that a lot of his buddies play games with the taxing authorities in this way: They just don't finish the building. He said, it can't be taxed until it's finished. Now you may ask, what are you going to do with an un-finished building?? But he simply means leave a drainspout off here or a shutter off there - those kinds of little things. Our bldg is done & our taxes are paid, and I wouldn't feel comfortable playing this game anyway, but does anyone out there know if this is true or not? Has anyone had a similar experience? THANKS

-- hmm (h.m.metheny@att.net), January 13, 2002

Answers

In South Dakota you were taxed based upon how complete the building was. So if your house was 60% by the end of the year, they assessed the partialy finished structure and taxed you. Interestingly at that time, pole buildings were not assessed because they did not have true foundations in the mind of the assesor. I suspect that has changed now though.

I cannot remember whether the barns in Ohio were assessed separately, I think that they were not. I know that my taxes did not go down when I removed 3 old structures at the request of the township. I do know that the ramshackle garage was assessed as a 2 car garage. Ohio had quite a few tax breaks for farmers though so perhaps that was the story there. I still have one farm in NH and recently paid the taxes, but i cannot lay my hands on the notice to see if the barn is listed separately.

I suspect the rules go by State or County or even township

Oscar

-- Oscar H. Will III (owill@mail.whittier.edu), January 13, 2002.


In Wyoming, pole barns and loafing sheds are not taxed until completed. An uncompleted polebarn means, no doors, windows, or partial roofing.

Fences are not taxed, even brand-new buck and rails. They're decorative, the assessor says.

-- matt johnson (wyo_cowboy_us@yahoo.com), January 13, 2002.


Been living in an 'un-finished' home for 5 years now and getting taxed on it. The guy we bought it from took 10 years to get it this far and was also taxed along the way. As Oscar mentioned, we in NM are also taxed on what's there and how far. (in un-finished, I mean: no railing on any deck/stairs, drywall only on the walls, no trim and some 1/2 log not up still on the outside.) Our case may be that it LOOKS finished from the outside... But I think it's fair to say they'll tax ya as soon as they can - finished or not!

-- Michelle in NM (naychurs_way@hotmail.com), January 13, 2002.

My thought is: If it has a roof it is taxed. But you say there is no ceiling? How naive, Whoever heard of a tax ceiling?. ;}

-- JR (jr3star@earthlink.net), January 13, 2002.

Up here in NW WA, we've been getting taxed on our unfinished house which we are living in without benefit of an occupancy permit. Technically, we could say, hey, you can't tax us for the bldg because it isn't occupiable. And they would say, hey, you can't occupy that bldg and therefore are in violation of your bldg permit and we're going to fine you and make it very difficult and expensive for you to reinstate your bldg permit, etc,etc. Thanks to the passage of a brainless tax initiative capping auto license fees to $30, thereby eliminating a source of revenue with which to fund all of the services we demand from the govt, last year alone our property has been re-assessed twice. It is still assessed less than the market value, and if we were to complain about the assessments, they would say, why, sure, we'd be happy to take a look at it again, and then, by golly, you were right -- we did assess wrongly: it should be HIGHER! And that we could expect regardless of the state of our occupancy permit.

-- snoozy (bunny@northsound.net), January 13, 2002.


This is going off on a tangent, but when I lived in a castle in Austria (Christian youth center)I learned that back in the 1800's a tax was put on the size of your roof. Hence, people who owned fortresses and castles (lots and lots of these in Austria) would have the roof ripped off so they wouldn't have to pay taxes; really sad, because that was the end of a lot of really cool old buildings.

-- Elizabeth in E TX (kimprice@peoplescom.net), January 13, 2002.

Here in WV you are taxed on the amount completed. So many % for each step of the way. Yes, some people do take advantage of this and take forever to complete the steps, however, the assessor folks do come out periodically and ask to see the building under discussion.

-- Anne (Healthytouch101@wildmail.com), January 13, 2002.

When in Amsterdam on vacation, went on a canal tour and was told that houses were taxed according to canal frontage, and the long flagpole- looking things were for hauling furniture up from the canal boat into the rooms!

-- GT (nospam@nospam.com), January 13, 2002.

Snoozy, what's wrong with a $30 cap on auto tags? Assessed value is not fair. Maybe more fair to tax gas guzzlers? Or the land yachts (mostly old dinosaur cars that are big polluters) that people drive? Or tax by how many axles or actual foot length of car? A car is a car, it takes up room on the road. Should be equal for everyone. Maybe higher gas taxes instead? That would make the people who really do most of the driving pay, which to many makes a lot of sense.

A house could be taxed simply by square footage, at the same rate for everyone, and levies/assessments should be a flat rate per address, and have nothing to do with size of house.

Just another point of view, from one who can't understand the fairness of assessed value (except to calculate one time sales tax) ad infinitum.

-- GT (nospam@nospam.com), January 13, 2002.


The people who cry loudest about the cost of their tabs are indeed the gas-guzzling FUV owners. My thought is that if they can afford the price of those things, in addition to paying for all that gas, in addition to polluting more, in addition to increasing our dependence on foreign oil, which in turn makes for a higher debt costs because of the balance of trade, then why shouldn't they pay more for their tabs? Moreover, by the sudden capping of this source of revenue for the state and counties, a whole bunch of other services have had to be cut. For instance, mass transit, which is more efficient, pollutes less, reduces traffic congestion and serves the needs of more people, especially those who cannot afford FUV's. Mass transit gets cut because some selfish materialists want to only pay $30 for their tabs, while they think nothing of throwing away scads of money every month on the interest on their car payments...that's my problem with it.

-- snoozy (bunny@northsound.net), January 13, 2002.


I also had in mind the people who are still driving OLD (like Pintos and Dodge Darts) cars (every so often in states like CA they will give you $500 (more than most of them are worth) or so if they are registered and running, just to get them off the roads because of the pollution) and have yet to do the math that they have long passed saving any money by keeping such inefficient vehicles. Sure, maybe they save in payments and registration costs, but they are spending it in gasoline costs.

I know many who own SUVs (paid for, by the way), who would buy the smaller cars if they had more headroom, or truly carried 5 comfortably as they advertise. New cars today are NOT made for anyone with a long torso--it is very uncomfortable (and dangerous) to drive with your head sideways. Nor are they made to carry 5 adults comfortably when there is a child seat in the center (not quite as bad when a booster seat is on the window side, but still uncomfortable), for any distance driving. They would buy more fuel-efficient ones if they were on the market, but they aren't.

I'm with you on the need for mass transit, but they should raise gas taxes for that to make up the difference.

-- GT (nospam@nospam.com), January 13, 2002.


Our farm trucks & irrigation jeeps are taxed as personal property, which they are, and are weighed once when you first apply for the plates. That's the only fair way of paying road use taxes. The heavier the vehicle, the higher the tax. State plates are still $60. Currently we pay $450-$600 per vehicle, per year, reduced by 16% each year for six years. By that time, you need a new or nearly new vehicle. Most of ours have btw 300-450K miles on them at trade-in time.

-- matt johnson (wyo_cowboy_us@yahoo.com), January 13, 2002.

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