JACKSON COUNTY, Mo. — A Jackson County homeowner says he spent most of his day off waiting in line to appeal his property tax assessment.
Like many others, he headed to the assessor earlier this week to beat the upcoming deadline.
Daniel Moorehead and his two kids spent over eight hours from check-in to check-out. He says between appointments and walk-ins, the county had four pages of names that day.
He was on the second page of the wait list.
He is just grateful he even had the time and ability to appeal — something he calls a “luxury.”
“I have the luxury of being able to come into a place like this and take a day off, spend some time with my boys and do this,” Moorehead said. “I have a good income — I don’t know that everyone does, to be able to handle something like this.”
Moorehead believes his home is worth about $220,000, but the county thinks it is worth over $320,000.
Compared to their assessment value of $177K last year, they would have had to pay $2,200 more in taxes.
“They were basically telling us that the market value for the house has gone up by 80%,” Moorehead said. “I actually argue that our property wasn’t worth what we paid for when we bought it.”
Their new home ran into several issues this year that would require major renovations. He is estimating $28,000 alone just for a septic system.
“It’s very discouraging to see this and to realize that the money you would’ve put towards improving your property and making it actually worth the value that you have, I couldn’t, I was being limited by a tax bill that almost doubled,” Moorehead said.
Thankfully, Moorehead and the assessor reached an agreement on Monday. He negotiated to bring down the 80% increase to a 20% increase.
“They are saying, something I own I have the ability to lose if I don’t pay that tax. So it feels a little bit like coercion at its core. But at this time though, 20% is a really good difference compared to the 80 that I had before,” Moorehead said. “There’s a bigger conversation we need to have about the nature of these taxes.”
Jackson County legislators will hold one more appeal workshop on the day of the deadline, Monday, July 10. Below are the details:
- 6 to 8 p.m. on Monday, July 10, at MCC-Penn Valley (3201 Southwest Trafficway, Kansas City, Missouri, 64111)
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