Fayette PVA David O'Neill

This interesting downtown project - 106 W. Vine St., is an eight-story 64,000 square foot office building owned and occupied for nearly 35 years by Landrum & Shouse law firm. It was sold late last year for $5.1 million to a developer who is converting it to luxury residential condos replete with retrofitted balconies. Even though Lexington is fortunate to not have much vacant office space like some other cities, it’s still interesting to see how properties can be repurposed.

Pick up a copy of the August Chevy Chaser Magazine or Southsider Magazine for a thorough explanation of property assessments. The electronic version is attached here, but there is more neighborhood specific data in the print editions.

I contribute an article for the July or August issues every year, but this year it is significantly expanded to explain how assessments are generated and how to protest them if necessary. This is a must read for any Lexington property owner.

The blue shaded area of the attached map is the portion of the county where residential neighborhoods will be evaluated for possible reassessments in 2025.

https://smileypete.com/community/the-state-of-local-real-estate-understanding-property-tax-as/

Approximately 500 new homes, excluding apartments, are built in Lexington each year, but that has not always been the case. The annual supply of new homes is down significantly (about 75%) over the last 25 years, bottoming out at 500 in 2011 - the depths of the recession, where it remains to this day. What affect on home prices would one expect from such a shift in supply vs demand?

About one fourth of Lexington homeowners recently received new property tax assessment notices and have expressed concern about the size of the increases. I also have serious concerns about the state of the housing market from an affordability standpoint in terms of not only buying and financing a home, but also renting and budgeting for taxes and other expenses. Therefore, I want you to have more information to help explain the process and the economic factors at play.

We are now four years into a period of rapidly escalating home prices in a housing market that was already robust. Home values are a direct reflection of local, current sale prices, which I have attached here in the form of a monthly, ten-year snapshot. Note the March column, the most recent data we have. Since 2014, Lexington home prices have exactly doubled, an average increase of 10% per year, every year.

The industry standard for determining a home's value, whether for taxes, appraising for bank loans, or determining a listing price with a real estate agent is through the analysis of comparable sales. You identify a few sales, preferably in the immediate area, of similar size and style homes with adjustments to the sale price for differences between the home being valued and the homes that sold for things like square footage, number of bathrooms, basements, garages, etc.

The Kentucky Constitution requires property be assessed at 100% fair cash value (what the property would bring in a sale between a willing seller and a willing buyer). And, while the KY department of revenue provides guidance for assessing property once every four years, due to government and industry shutdowns in 2020 and 2021, most homes since 2022 are being reassessed for the first time in five or six years, and this will also be the case in 2025.

Since prices are increasing at 10% and higher per year, reassessing every four years will commonly result in increases in assessments of 30% - 50%, which can be understandably surprising and concerning.

It is important for homeowners to understand the assessment process. I perform "mass assessing" not individual home appraisals. There are 114,000 properties in Fayette County and we only perform a "windshield inspection" of the property once every four years. The assessment you receive in the mail reflects our best, educated and technology-backed estimate of your home's value. But that is not the end of the process. Carefully read the information contained within your assessment notice and utilize the protest process to share additional information that may result in a more accurate assessment. We have moved the protest process almost entirely online and it has never been easier for you to participate in the assessment process - so please do so.

The median home sales price in Lexington has ballooned to $300,000, and increasing at an average rate of 10% per year. Median sale price in Lexington has increased in all but one of the last 72 months!

Experts are now predicting, when mortgage rates come down early this year, we probably will not see a flood of houses coming onto the market, which in theory would stabilize pricing.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/what-will-happen-to-home-prices-if-mortgage-rates-fall/

Our team extends deepest condolences to the family and friends of former deputy PVA Linda Taulbee. Linda was the mother of former Fayette PVA Renee (True) Harper and the widow of former Fayette sheriff Lonas Taulbee. Linda was a hard worker who gave many years of service to the community in various county government offices.

Obituary information for Linda Mae Taulbee View Linda Mae Taulbee's obituary, contribute to their memorial, see their funeral service details, and more.

DO RECENT HOME PRICE TRENDS IN LEXINGTON MATCH WHAT'S HAPPENING NATIONALLY?

No.

Nationally, the year-over-year increase in median sales price has steadily declined in each of the past 12 months. Presumably, the desired affect of the Fed's eight interest rate hikes over that period.

But that trend does not translate to Lexington's sales prices. In fact, the median sales price grew in January by 12% over last year, higher than the 10.3% 12-month average.

WHAT HAPPENED TO THE LISTS OF HOME SALES IN THE SUNDAY PAPER?!

I know you miss the sales in the Homeseller section of the Sunday paper. No Worries! We've been churning out an electronic version for years - and it's much better.

Visit FayettePVA.com, look in the lower right corner under News Feed, click on the most recent sales report, which opens in a PDF. The sales are listed by zip code, just like you're used to, and the property address is a hyperlink to the full property record card where you will find much more information about each property.

By the way, sales in the paper were provided by a feed from the county clerk's office which is no longer available. The PVA office had nothing to do with the paper version.
I can't believe you haven't been using this feature all along!