Welcome
Welcome to the Vision Appraisal Revaluation Information Site for the Town of Meredith, New Hampshire. The goal of this site is to explain the purpose for the current revaluation as well as to help the taxpayers understand what has been happening in the Meredith real estate market over the last few years. As you navigate through the content, you will find a section that helps you understand how your property was assessed as well as a section that will help you to prepare for a hearing if you feel the need to contest your value. We have also included an overview of a typical revaluation project, videos that will help familiarize you with the various steps involved in a revaluation as well as useful links to assessing industry sites. We hope that this page allows you to better understand what can appear to be a complicated and confusing process. Please keep in mind that your new assessment reflects a change in the market over a three year period since the valuation update completed in 2003.
Update from the Assessor
As you may be aware from newspaper, television, and on-line reports, the New Hampshire real estate market has been extremely active over the last five or six years. The latest equalization study performed by the Department of Revenue Administration calculates the Meredith assessment ratio as of April 1, 2005 at 63.3%. This means the current assessments prior to revaluation were significantly below the 2006 market value. Please keep in mind that although your assessment may have increased substantially this does not necessarily mean that your taxes will increase. A new lower tax rate will be determined by the Department of Revenue Administration in the fall. As you will see if you look at the links to the right, specifically Taxpayer Assistance, Overview of Market Conditions, these increases have affected different property types at varying rates.
Revaluation Summary
A Revaluation is the process of performing all of the necessary Market Analysis and Valuation steps to determine accurate and equitable values for all properties within a municipality. The equalization of values within a City or Town creates a fair distribution of the tax burden. The purpose of a Revaluation is not to raise taxes. The purpose is to create an equitable distribution of the tax load. The Town of Meredith with the assistance of Vision Appraisal is performing a Revaluation of all property for 2006 as a means of bringing assessments in line with current market conditions thus creating fairness and equity in the tax base.
See the flowchart below for all of the actual steps in a Revaluation.
Click on the stages in the flowchart for a description. Each Step of this flowchart is not necessarily part of every Revaluation.
Other Information
There are a number of links provided here that may be of interest to taxpayers. There is also an excellent article reprinted here from The Lincoln Institute of Land Policy on issues pertaining to the property tax. (Click Here to read the article) Also, please see the video presentations on Revaluations.
Suggestions
We are always looking to improve this website and welcome any Feedback. Please note: this is not an area for posing project specific questions. Due to the individual nature of each project, we cannot answer specific questions.
Press Inquiries
All press inquiries should be directed to the following page - (Press Inquiries). We will do our best to direct the inquiry to the proper party and get back to you as soon as possible.