Still, area assessors pointed out that results were mixed. In some counties, most growth in assessments came from the annual 2 percent increase for inflation allowed under Proposition 13. In all counties, thousands of properties were worth less than their previous assessed value – the purchase price plus inflation – because 1978′s Proposition 8 lets the assessment temporarily drop to match the fallen property value.

“Remember, property values plummeted so low that we haven’t come close to making up the losses we’ve experienced,” said Jean Hurst, legislative representative for the California State Association of Counties. “This is no windfall by any means, but it’s a function of the stabilization and the gradual uptick that economists tell us the recovery will look like.”

San Francisco, Santa Clara and San Mateo counties had the biggest increases in the Bay Area, and among the biggest in the state.

“We are clearly on the way back up,” said San Francisco Assessor Phil Ting, noting that it is the only county in the state that never experienced a downturn in its property tax roll over the past few years. “We believe this is probably the last year that many homeowners will be getting a reduction (of assessed value) because the market is coming back.”

Silicon Valley growth

Both San Mateo and Santa Clara counties said they benefited from Silicon Valley firms’ expansion.

“The resurgence here is being led by business,” said Larry Stone, assessor for Santa Clara County, where the overall roll was up 3.25 percent. “The office market is on fire. As spaces lease up, they begin to build out the insides.”

Once businesses lease space and add staff, they buy equipment. That was apparent in both counties as the category of “business personal property,” which includes machinery, computers and fixtures, rose 6.48 percent in Santa Clara County and 5.45 percent in San Mateo.

Still, both counties had tens of thousands of homes that were assessed lower.

“It appears we’re gradually pulling out of the slump,” said Mark Church, assessor of San Mateo County, where the roll rose by 3.33 percent. “We’re moving in the right direction, but we’re not there yet.”

Property tax revenue is split among schools, counties, cities and special assessment districts. The plunge in real estate values resulted in an even tighter budget crunch for those entities.

This year, after three years of minimal or negative growth, Santa Clara County, with the biggest roll in the Bay Area – reflecting the value of Silicon Valley businesses and affluent residential communities – saw an extra $9.7 billion in assessed value. At a 1 percent tax rate, that translates to $97 million more in tax revenue.

But in Solano, the worst-performing Bay Area county, the roll was down by 3.12 percent or $1.22 billion, meaning $12.2 million less in tax revenue.

Wide disparities were evident even within a single county.

Take San Mateo, for instance. Atherton, where the cheapest house for sale is asking $1.595 million, saw assessed values rise more than 9 percent, but in East Palo Alto, where many home values hover around $300,000, the assessments were down 2 percent.

“We’re seeing sharp contrasts between the high-end locations and the entry-level locations,” Church said.

East Bay moderate

In East Bay counties, increases were more moderate.

Alameda County was up 2.14 percent, just a tad ahead of the inflationary increase. “It’s going to take a long time” to fully recover from the downturn, said Brian Hitomi, chief deputy assessor.

Contra Costa’s 0.86 percent growth was largely due to an appeals board decision that increased the value of Chevron’s Richmond refinery for 2007, 2008 and 2009. The tax bump for all three years is reflected in the 2012-13 roll.

“It’s a one-time thing,” said assessor Gus Kramer. “Anyone who hangs their hat on that economically going forward is a fool.”

Contra Costa’s real estate market is basically flat, he said.

“The market is bouncing on the bottom and trying to recover,” he said. “There are some areas that are pretty healthy,” such as the affluent communities of Danville, Lafayette, Moraga and Orinda.

Likewise, the North Bay was fairly stagnant, other than Solano County’s 3.12 percent decline. With towns like Vallejo ravaged by the foreclosure crisis, Solano reduced assessments for more than half of all properties. Since 2007, its roll has fallen by 17.16 percent or $7.849 billon.

Napa County saw a 2.06 percent rise, “mostly due to the inflationary increase,” said Steve Schellhamer, assistant assessor. “Although it’s positive, it would be premature at this point to declare that we’re out of the slump.”

Marin nearly flat

Marin County’s assessed roll nudged up just 0.82 percent.

“The good news is that we don’t see things going dramatically south anymore,” said Assessor Rich Benson. “I don’t think it’s time to say that the market has turned around yet, but we’re seeing some positive indicators.”

He and other assessors pointed out that home sales have been robust throughout the spring. Since assessments for the 2012-13 tax year look at values as of Jan. 1, 2012, those stronger sales aren’t yet factored in.

Sonoma County, which got an extension to close its roll in late July, expects it to be flat.

“I hope we’re close to the bottom,” said Bill Rousseau, chief deputy assessor.

Property tax assessments slowly rise

For the 2012-13 tax year, property tax rolls in most Bay Area counties edged up, even while thousands of homes still had assessments temporarily reduced because their values had declined. Assessments consider value as of Jan. 1, so the recent surge in the real estate market is not yet reflected.

{+1} In billions

{+2} Under Proposition 8, passed in 1978, properties are temporarily assessed lower when their market value falls below their previously assessed value – the purchase price plus an annual increase of 2% or the California Consumer Price Index, whichever is less. When the market rebounds, properties can be reassessed to this “factored base year value.”

{+3} Sonoma County numbers are estimates; roll will close in late July.

Source: County assessors

Carolyn Said is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail: csaid@sfchronicle.com

Article source: http://www.sfgate.com/business/article/Property-tax-assessments-gradually-bouncing-back-3690479.php

When Robert Shiller, co-creator of the SP/Case-Shiller Home Price Indices , speaks, he tends to make headlines, and yesterday was no different.

Claiming that he wasn’t making any predictions, he predicted that home prices could fall another 25 percent.

“That wouldn’t surprise me at all,” he hedged. And there was the headline, tragic as it is.

I happened to be at the conference yesterday where he said that. In fact, I was a speaker/panelist at the Standard and Poors “Housing Summit 2011: Boom, Bust and Beyond.” And, no offense, but that wasn’t the headline. What really struck me was what he said right before that.

“Statisticians deal with things that repeat themselves. This housing boom and bust is so historic and unprecedented, you can’t forecast the future because you have no comparison.”

That was not only the headline, but the theme of the conference, as I sat on a panel with economists from SP, Experian and Columbia Business School. Chip Case was there as well, disagreeing with Shiller on several points.

Audience members, largely from the finance industry, kept asking the same question in different ways, ‘When is this all going to get better??’

Page 1 of 3 | Next Page
Show Entire Article

Greek PM to Reshuffle Cabinet; IMF ‘Concerned’

ECB’s Wellink Calls for Doubling of Euro Bail-Out Fund

Government Bonds ‘Should Be Avoided’: Analysts

Investors Bet on Prospect of ‘Greek Accident’

Bank of England May Be Forced to Raise Rate: Economist

More Top Stories

Article source: http://www.cnbc.com/id/43354956?__source=RSS*blog*&par=RSS

When Robert Shiller, co-creator of the SP/Case-Shiller Home Price Indices , speaks, he tends to make headlines, and yesterday was no different.

Claiming that he wasn’t making any predictions, he predicted that home prices could fall another 25 percent.

“That wouldn’t surprise me at all,” he hedged. And there was the headline, tragic as it is.

I happened to be at the conference yesterday where he said that. In fact, I was a speaker/panelist at the Standard and Poors “Housing Summit 2011: Boom, Bust and Beyond.” And, no offense, but that wasn’t the headline. What really struck me was what he said right before that.

“Statisticians deal with things that repeat themselves. This housing boom and bust is so historic and unprecedented, you can’t forecast the future because you have no comparison.”

That was not only the headline, but the theme of the conference, as I sat on a panel with economists from SP, Experian and Columbia Business School. Chip Case was there as well, disagreeing with Shiller on several points.

Audience members, largely from the finance industry, kept asking the same question in different ways, ‘When is this all going to get better??’

Page 1 of 3 | Next Page
Show Entire Article

$49 Billion Later, Muni’s See 1st Inflow Post Whitney Scare

As Fed-and Markets-Pull Back, What Can Investors Do?

Major Banks Likely to Get Reprieve on New Capital Rules

Fed Will Buy $50 Billion of Treasurys in Final QE2 Push

Can Apple Anchor a Shopping Mall? Don’t Count on It

More Top Stories

Article source: http://www.cnbc.com/id/43354956?__source=RSS*blog*&par=RSS

Ideally, buyers would like to know that the market has hit bottom and that the value of what they buy won’t decline. Sellers, who will sell at a loss today, wonder if they should get out now or wait for a better market to sell.

When will that better market appear? It’s impossible to time the market. We’ll know that we hit bottom after the market turns around, not before. Some economists think this will take another two years; others expect a turnaround in five to six years.

Many economists think we’re at or close to bottom. However, it’s expected that the market will be rocky for some time. The market will change seasonally. For example, it’s typical for home sales to decline during the winter months.

House Hunting Tip: Good and bad news can affect whether buyers feel optimistic about homebuying. The fact that the conforming jumbo loan limit is likely to drop to $625,000 from $729,750 could spur home sales in higher-priced markets between now and September when the higher loan limit expires.

Interest rates have been fluctuating, but remain below 5 percent for conforming fixed-rate mortgages. Interest rates and affordability in general have a great impact on the strength of the housing market.

The news about the real estate market was discouraging at the beginning of the year as hopes of a solid recovery were dashed by declining home-sale volume and prices. Some economists even predicted that the housing market was headed for a double-dip recession, but this doesn’t look likely at this point.

March brought good news as home-sale volume nationally picked up 3.7 percent from February, according to the National Association of Realtors. However, the sales were primarily driven by investors buying cheap foreclosures.

Although investor purchases were up, the percentage of first-time-buyer purchases was down, possibly due to tough mortgage qualifying criteria, which are expected to become even more difficult going forward.

Leslie Appleton-Young, chief economist for the California Association of Realtors, points out that it’s difficult for buyers to trade up or down if they don’t have equity in their homes. According to CAR, about 25 percent of homeowners in the U.S. owe more than their home is worth. Appleton-Young believes the figure is closer to 31 percent in California.

As grim as the picture looks, it’s not the same everywhere. Residential real estate is a localized phenomenon. The San Francisco Bay Area is a good example. Although median prices are still lower than they were a year ago, the number of homes sold in the Bay Area in March was the best showing in four years. Sales volume was up 41.3 percent from February and up 0.2 percent from a year ago, according to MDA Data Quick.

However, within the Bay Area there was considerable diversity. Several higher-priced counties, which haven’t seen much activity until recently, saw gains. These included San Mateo County, where sales were up 8.6 percent, and Santa Clara County, up 3.9 percent. Both counties benefit from the Silicon Valley rebound. Jobs are necessary for a healthy housing market.

In Alameda County, home sales declined 7 percent in March. Even so, there are hot spots within the county. Select neighborhoods close to shops, transportation and good schools defied statistics with high buyer demand and over-asking-price sales.

The Closing: Keep an eye on trends, but focus on your local neighborhood when making decisions about buying and selling.

Dian Hymer, a real estate broker with more than 30 years’ experience, is a nationally syndicated real estate columnist and author of “House Hunting: The Take-Along Workbook for Home Buyers” and “Starting Out, The Complete Home Buyer’s Guide.”

Article source: http://www.lvrj.com/real_estate/no-way-to-time-market-123153123.html?ref=123

During one of my reports today on how gas prices could affect the housing recovery, one of the anchors asked me if I really believe there is a housing recovery right now.

That’s a very good question.

Yesterday, the Realtors chief economist questioned it himself.

Today a new report from Robert Shiller’s outfit, MacroMarkets, found that of 111 housing market experts and economists surveyed, nearly half foresee a double-dip in home prices happening this year, “and not a single panelist expects national home prices to recover to the pre-bubble trend in the coming 5 years.” In December, only 15 percent projected a new post-crash low would materialize for home prices. We are now less than 1 percent away from that mark, according to the survey.

“Overall, the sentiment among our expert panel regarding the U.S. housing market outlook continues to deteriorate,” writes Shiller. “Now they are expecting only a weak recovery, and even that is not until 2013.”

This report comes on the same day that Fannie Mae’s chief economist put out a report claiming uncertainty in Japan and trouble in Libya will directly affect housing’s recovery, specifically citing rising gas prices.

Page 1 of 2 | Next Page
Show Entire Article

Is Housing Really in Recovery?

France Could Extend Libya Operations Beyond Benghazi

New Retirement: Focus on Foreign Stocks

Netflix to Become Cable Company to the World?

Buffett Looking at Investing in India, Large Countries

More Top Stories

Article source: http://www.cnbc.com/id/42216840?__source=RSS*blog*&par=RSS