It’s come to our attention that a recent mailing soliciting Owners to file independent tax valuation appeals, with promises of substantial tax savings, is raising questions.

We can confirm PTCA has a tax attorney who files appeals on behalf of all owners. Generally, management would suggest owners not appeal your Cook County property tax valuation individually since the condo association files collective appeals. Filing a separate individual appeal automatically opts you out of the association’s group appeal, which almost always weakens your case and risks a lower tax reduction. On top of that, in Cook County, we are told the Assessor’s Office strongly prefers analyzing a condominium building as a single cohesive entity rather than piece-meal. So, it could work against you even more…since that creates more work for them.

To set the stage…The Cook County Assessor calculates the market value of the entire building first, typically based on overall building sales and market uniformity. Once the county determines the total building value, your individual tax assessment is automatically calculated using your exact percentage of common element ownership. When the assessor is considering the big picture in this way, appeals have a much higher success rate because they provide a comprehensive look at the whole property, matching how the Assessor’s formula actually operates. Filing an individual appeal means the county will remove your unit PIN (Property Index Number) from the association’s joint petition. Such an owner will still be stuck paying your share of the association’s legal fees or group costs through your regular assessments, even though you no longer benefit from their collective result.

Though for anyone considering an individual appeal, we would strongly recommend you have us run any questions by our tax attorney first. In most cases though, one should only consider filing a separate appeal if you have a highly specific, unique issue that affects only your unit and would not be included in a building-wide market analysis. Other factors that could be considered, though rare, would be if the county’s records show the wrong square footage, bedroom count, or structural details for your specific unit. Also, if your individual unit suffered isolated major damage (such as localized fire or severe water pipe destruction) that makes it uninhabitable for a long period of time. And finally, if an owner bought a unit very recently at a market price that is significantly lower than what the county’s current assessment reflects.

If you think there is some issue with your valuation that might need consideration let us know first, and if it makes sense we will run it by the Association’s attorney. We’ve already sent a copy of this solicitation and asked them to share their thoughts and comments about it, and we will update this post once we have their response.

In the meantime, if you have any questions, e-mail our team at parktowercondo-mgmt@habitat.com.