When looking at an MLS listing I see an assesment value, it is nowhere near the listing price. What does this value mean? For example, I am looking at one now that had an original listing price of $220,000…now selling for $199,000…assesment shows $58,730. ???
Im not sure if its for everywhere. Its the tax assessment your county or state makes to determine what property taxes you have to pay. Here they do a quick inspection looking at the outside of the home and property. The home I am living in now has a tax assessment of 55000 but is work at around 90k.
yes that is the TAX assesed value - the value the tax appraiser says your home is worth for a tax structure for them to base their millage on.Here in florida we had a good rule of thumb for retail value and that was to take the tax value and times it by 1.5 ( tax value $100,000 times 1.5 = sell price of $150,000)and that was what you could sell the home for . It was a great ,pretty reliable, method I used for 2 years and it worked great . But with the HUGE appreciation we have been experiencing that doesnt hold true any more 
I look at other towns around the country and their homes are selling for the tax value or less . Its so hard to go into a strange town and get a true tried formula for end retail value. I find that even sold prices from you local realtor are good but without knowing the town those prices are all over the place ."well that must have been a foreclosure " , “well that one is way over priced” " well that one must have been on the market for a long time " How do you determine True value in a town your not familiar with ?
In the example above the tax value was 1/4 of the listing value… :o Guess that 1.5 rule isn’t helpful anymore…
In my town the assessed value is always lower than listing price or sales price. I bought my house in 2000 for 86K when the assessed value was 68k. When I got my last assessment notice, it had jump to 97k which I disputed and brought it down to 86k (big difference on an ammortized mortgage pmnt). I recently pulled some equity to replace my roof and my house appraised for 150k. In most cases (in Texas anyway) the assessed value has nothing to with FMV. It will be that way until the county can hire enough people to keep up with all the most recent sales. Don’t see that happening here.
Carolann
Most of CT will be re-assessed in 2006. However in our area and in this market, these numbers should not be considered for the purposes of making an offer.