Service
Real estate assessment review & appeal
A property tax appeal challenges the assessor’s opinion of what your property is worth. CPT reviews your assessments every year in every jurisdiction where you hold property, identifies the parcels carried above fair market value, and pursues the appeals that will actually return relief — from informal conference through the state tax tribunal.
Why assessments drift above market value
Assessors are mass appraisers. They value thousands of parcels on a single cycle with limited data, rarely see the inside of a building, and work from cost tables and land schedules that lag the market. Nothing in that process is designed to catch the things that make your specific property worth less than the model says.
Functional obsolescence — an outdated floor plate, excess ceiling height nobody needs, a single-purpose layout — is invisible on a cost table. So is economic obsolescence from a soft submarket, a lost anchor tenant, or a cap rate that moved 150 basis points. Deferred maintenance, environmental conditions, deed restrictions, and easements are unrecognized until someone brings evidence.
The cost of not looking is permanent. Nearly every jurisdiction closes its appeal window on a fixed statutory date, and once it closes, that year’s overpayment is not recoverable. An assessment nobody challenged becomes the base the next year is built on.
What our review covers
We start from the three recognized approaches to value and test the assessment against each one that applies to your property type — cost, sales comparison, and income capitalization — then look at the issues that sit outside the valuation model entirely.
- Fair market value under the cost, sales comparison, and income approaches
- Physical, functional, and economic obsolescence not reflected in the roll
- Equalization and assessment-ratio analysis against comparable properties in the jurisdiction
- Property classification, and whether it carries the correct rate and exemptions
- Personal property and intangible business value double-counted inside the real estate assessment
- Land-to-building ratio, excess land, and unusable or encumbered acreage
- Common-area and allocation errors across multi-parcel and multi-tenant holdings
- Vacancy, collection loss, and expense assumptions used in the assessor’s income model
How an appeal actually proceeds
Appeal procedure is set by state statute and varies substantially, but almost every jurisdiction moves through the same sequence, with a hard deadline attached to each step.
- 01
Annual review
Every assessment notice you receive is reviewed against our value conclusion. Most portfolios have a handful of parcels worth contesting and many that are not — knowing which is which is the point of the review.
- 02
Valuation analysis and recommendation
Before anything is filed you get the estimated relief, the evidence supporting it, the likelihood of success, and what the engagement will cost. You decide which parcels to pursue.
- 03
Informal conference with the assessor
A large share of appeals resolve here. Assessors will correct a demonstrable error without a hearing, and it is the fastest and cheapest path to relief.
- 04
Board of review or county board
The first formal level. We prepare and present the valuation evidence and respond to the assessor’s position on the record.
- 05
State tribunal or court
Where the value gap justifies it, the appeal proceeds to the state tax tribunal, board of tax appeals, or district court, with appraisal and expert support as the venue requires.
- 06
Refund and roll correction
A successful appeal is not finished until the corrected value reaches the roll and the refund or credit is confirmed on the bill.
Multi-state portfolios, managed centrally
A portfolio spread across a dozen states means a dozen sets of deadlines, evidentiary standards, and filing formats. Handled locally, it becomes a dozen relationships to manage and a dozen chances to miss a date.
We manage the calendar for the whole portfolio from one place, with a single point of contact, consistent valuation methodology across jurisdictions, and consolidated reporting so your tax and accounting teams see the whole position rather than a stack of individual notices.
Common questions
How do I know whether my property is over-assessed?
Compare the assessor’s implied market value — the assessed value divided by the jurisdiction’s assessment ratio — against what the property would actually sell for or what its income supports. If the implied value is meaningfully higher than either, there is likely a case. That comparison is the first thing our annual review does, and it costs you nothing to have it run.
What does an appeal cost?
Valuation and appeal work is contingency-based: our fee is a share of the tax savings we actually deliver. If the appeal returns nothing, there is no fee. The rate is agreed in writing before any work begins and is scoped to the opportunity, because a single over-assessed parcel and a multi-state portfolio are not the same engagement. Compliance and audit defense are quoted as a fixed fee instead, since that work is recurring and its scope is known up front.
How long does a property tax appeal take?
An issue resolved informally with the assessor can close in weeks. A board of review decision typically lands within the same tax year. A state tribunal case can run one to three years depending on the venue’s docket and whether appraisal testimony is required. Relief is generally retroactive to the year under appeal, so a longer case does not mean a smaller refund.
Will appealing cause the assessor to raise my value or audit me?
Filing an appeal does not trigger an audit, and in most jurisdictions the assessor cannot increase the value simply because it was contested. What an appeal does do is put the valuation on the record, which is why the analysis is done before anything is filed — we do not contest an assessment we cannot support.
What if the appeal deadline has already passed?
For that tax year, relief is usually gone; appeal deadlines are jurisdictional, and assessors have no authority to waive them. A limited set of remedies survive the deadline — clerical error corrections, mutual mistake provisions, and exemption claims in some states. It is worth asking, but the durable fix is getting on an annual review cycle so the next notice is caught in time.
Related services
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A review of returns already filed to recover overpayments, plus representation when an assessor or contract auditor comes calling.
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Read more →Start with a review, not an engagement.
Tell us what you own and where. We will tell you whether there is an opportunity worth pursuing.