The key to understanding property taxes is to grasp how they are figured. It is done differently in each state, but most methods involve a municipality setting a rate. This rate is then multiplied times the assessed value of your home. The resulting figure represents what you owe, which is also known as a millage.

The first thing to consider when appealing is the date of appraisal for your home or land. Some areas only assess home values every two to three years. As a result, you could be paying property taxes on the value of your home in 2006, which was undoubtedly much higher than it is now. Through an appeal, you can have the current home value used which will result in lower taxes.

The bigger issue to consider, however, is the point of this article. The appraisal of any home is a subjective matter. This is particularly true when it comes to property taxes. Many municipalities farm out the work to assessors. Do you recall letting any of these assessors in your home? No. This is because they do “drive by” assessments. They have hundreds or thousands of assessments to do, so doing them as quickly as possible is their goal. This, however, leads to fault assumptions.

An assessor in a drive by situation will often eyeball the home and guess how many bedrooms, bathrooms and so on it has. You can have the assessors file for your home pulled at the assessment office. Inspect it and you should fine plenty of errors. In fact, it is estimated 60 percent of them are wrong. If the errors result in an overstated value for your home, you can file an appeal showing the true dimensions and have your property taxes lowered.

Times are tight on the financial side of things. Don’t overpay your property taxes. Check the appraised value to see if it is up to date and accurate. If not, file an appeal!

Thomas Ajava is with PropertyTaxAttorneyinMontana.com – your online resource for finding a property tax attorney in Montana.