Luzerne County officials weigh in on latest property assessment accuracy report

Luzerne County’s assessed values became increasingly less accurate last year due to high real estate sales prices, but officials expect this trend to reverse.

Monitoring is necessary to determine if a countywide reassessment is warranted, and there are no plans to proceed with a mass revaluation at this time.

The accuracy reading comes from the State Tax Equalization Board’s annual comparison of county assessed values to actual real estate purchase prices, which yields a statistic called a “common level ratio.”

An ideal ratio is 100, which means purchase prices closely mirror assessments.

Ratios below that score indicate more real estate purchases are above assessments — a sign of underassessment.

The county’s new ratio: 69.4.

This is a drop from last year’s ratio of 76.

County Chief Assessor/Assessment Director Kristin Montgomery said the new ratio, which takes effect July 1, was based on 11,890 real estate purchases in the county that occurred last year.

Since then, Montgomery has reviewed real estate transactions completed the first quarter of this year and said she is starting to observe more purchase prices coming down and landing closer to the assessed values.

As a result, Montgomery expects the county common level ratio to start rising again and moving back toward the ideal 100.

She recommends further observation before the county contemplates another reassessment.

County Manager Romilda Crocamo concurred with that recommendation, saying the “local housing market mirrors what is happening nationally, with home sales bouncing back and forth.”

“When property values become inconsistent, unfair and too old to reflect current trends and changes in the value of real estate with the passage of time, that’s when a countywide reassessment is needed,” Crocamo said. “Based on the information that the assessment office is reviewing, we aren’t there yet.”

The last countywide reassessment took effect 14 years ago, in 2009, and had been the first mass revaluation since 1965. Four years of sales data were used to calculate the worth of all parcels on the fixed date of Jan. 2, 2008. Assessment challenges have led to thousands of value adjustments, most reductions, since then.

Initially, the county’s ratio was 99.7 after the reassessment, and it climbed as high as 109.9 in 2013, records show. The ratio was 101.1 in 2019, before it started the current downward trajectory.

Ratios surpassing 100 would indicate more overassessment due to purchases landing below assessed values. However, none of the state’s 67 counties have ratios above 100, according to the new state report.

For perspective, only six counties have more accurate ratios closer to the ideal 100 than Luzerne’s, the report shows: Adams, 83.9; Blair, 83.6; Cumberland, 80.9; Indiana, 90.4; Philadelphia, 93.5; and Washington, 75.3.

With the exception of Cumberland, Luzerne County had a better ratio than other counties grouped in the same “third class” category with populations ranging from 210,000 to 499,999.

The ratios of other third-class counties, the report said: Berks, 39.8; Chester, 36; Dauphin, 46.6; Erie, 63.1; Lackawanna, 6.8; Lehigh, 56.8; Northampton, 19.4; Westmoreland, 10; and York, 56.9.

Two neighboring counties are in the process of completing reassessments — Lackawanna and Schuylkill.

Lackawanna last completed a reassessment in 1968, the county’s assessment page says, noting that was when the cost of a gallon of gas was 34 cents and a hamburger at McDonald’s cost 18 cents.

“With such an out-of-date system, it is possible for property owners with similar houses to pay different amounts of property tax,” its website says.

Schuylkill County’s reassessment stemmed from a lawsuit filed by property owners asserting the values from the last 1996 reassessment were “no longer fair and consistent,” the county’s website said. The county’s independent expert concluded the values failed to meet standards.

The next reassessment here would not be as daunting because the county assessor’s office now has detailed property information, including sales data, that it continues to update as properties are built and modified, officials have said.

The last revaluation cost $8 million and was more involved because each parcel had to be photographed and reviewed from scratch to create a computerized property database.