A consulting firm’s sweeping reassessment of property values in Habersham County is still about six months away from completion, according to county tax officials.
After a Habersham County Board of Tax Assessor’s meeting Tuesday, Chief Appraiser Joan Church said McCormick & Associates is still in the groundwork phases of reevaluating properties across the county. She said minor delays from Hurricane Helene briefly stalled the conversion and data entry process, which is now scheduled for completion by Dec. 1.
Last year, Habersham County agreed to pay McCormick just over $1.1 million for three years to reassess residential, industrial and commercial properties countywide.
A breakdown of those funds includes $50,000 for the supervision of new software installation and $75,000 for commercial property assessments, as well as almost $1 million to reassess all other property. The reappraisal project came after a state review of tax assessment procedures in Habersham County discovered various communication issues and miscalculations by employees and former board members.
‘Greater uniformity’
Habersham County’s Tax Assessor’s Office is now confident assessments will be readjusted to accurately reflect true property value after McCormick’s review, officials said Tuesday. As part of the firm’s reappraisal effort, Church said McCormick will look at older properties that “haven’t seen sales activity in years.”
And while past board members believed commercial property evaluations in particular were undervalued, Church says the countywide reexamination will bring greater “uniformity in the data,” with some values up and others down.
“We’re about a one-fourth of the way through the parcels,” Church said. “(McCormick) has been visiting (properties) in the county, going parcel to parcel. Hopefully, as soon as they’re able to start (entering data), it won’t take that long to get an idea of where we are.”
With assessment notices due to go out in July of 2025, both Church and board members hope to see the project wrapped up by May. “We’re hoping that we will have it done before then,” Church said.
New software
The tax assessor’s office also could soon see installation of WinGap software, a computerized property appraisal system they believe will optimize the process of calculating property values.
WinGap, a widely-used system specific to Georgia, would replace Habersham’s previous system BI-Tek.
“We’re excited because it’s going to give us the most up-to-date technology. WinGap makes (Habersham) compatible with the state agency (the Department of Revenue) that oversees Church’s office,” Habersham Tax Assessors Board Chairman Bill Terry said. “Joan Church and her office are doing a fantastic job.”
Impact on tax digest
Over the summer, preliminary figures for Habersham’s latest 2024 digest suggested a 12% rise in growth – including residential, industrial and commercial property – compared to last year.
Those numbers also estimated a value of $1.4 million in revenue from industrial property, plus a total of $3.7 million from commercial property, since last year. Total values for industrial property was just over $1.4 million and $3.3 million for commercial property the previous year. Projections in the 2024 digest estimate an additional $470,000 in revenue compared to 2023.
If values of commercial and industrial properties rise after reassessment, the county could see a significant boost in potential revenue and even greater digest numbers next year.
Habersham County Manager Alicia Vaughn told board members on Tuesday that she feels the county is “in a good place, especially considering everything.”
“The fact that we are doing this countywide reassessment…I feel like we’re in a much better place than a lot of counties are,” she said.
