Real Estate Appraisal and Assessment

What does the Auditor's appraisal department do?

The Lucas County Auditor's Office is in charge of assessing every parcel in the county to determine a fair market value.

Our staff is often in the field doing site visits to determine a number of things including:

Verifying and updating data for parcels that we have been notified of a change via permit
Verifying agricultural compliance for the Current Agricultural Use Valuation (CAUV) program
Updating land use types in accordance with updates from municipalities
Updating and allocating values due to split or combined parcels
Verifying real estate data for upcoming county-wide value changes

Property Value Updates

The Auditor's Reappraisal and Triennial set the fair market value of properties in Lucas County.

By law, valuation occurs twice in a six year cycle; first Revaluation then Triennial three years later.

The last Lucas County Revaluation was 2024, and 2021 was the last Triennial.

Revaluation

The Revaluation occurs every 6-years and is a period where all properties in Lucas County are addressed based on individual characteristics as well as market changes.

During a Revaluation, the valuation factors in the Auditor's Computer Assisted Mass Appraisal (CAMA) system is updated based on trends in the market. For example, if single-story homes are selling at higher prices than two-story homes, those influence factors are updated based on that sales data.

Because of these value factor adjustments to the CAMA system, during a Revaluation, not all properties' values change by the same percentage. Based on what the market indicates for specific factors, properties can change by different percentages based on their factors. For example, if single story homes are selling for more than two story homes, then ranch style homes may increase by a larger percentage than a two story home with more square footage.

Triennial

The Triennial Update occurs in the 3-year halfway point between Revaluations.

During a Triennial Update, property values are adjusted on a neighborhood-scale based on sales data. Similar properties in a neighborhood will likely adjust by approximately the same percentage.

Lucas County and the State of Ohio perform sales ratio studies to ensure the value adjustment is within the 90-110% acceptable range of the International Association of Assessing Officers (IAAO) standard.

Once each neighborhood adjustment is determined compliant to IAAO standard, each neighborhood property value increases or decreases by a set percentage.

Property Values vs. Property Taxes

Values are only one part of the real estate taxation equation. Taxes are based on the local tax rate (determined primarily by levies passed by the taxpayer) multiplied by the property's assessed value (35% of the fair market value).

Local tax rates are applied to calculate each tax bill. Taxes are also adjusted when State-mandated reductions, called rollbacks, are applied to the tax rate.

For those that qualify, reductions include an Owner-Occupied Credit and the Homestead Exemption for senior citizens and disabled persons. Other reductions include House Bill 920, which is automatically applied to all properties. House Bill 920 works by reducing the amount of tax dollars that entities can collect to the amount that was approved by voters at the ballot box. What this means is that, generally speaking, when property values go up, property tax rates go down, to ensure that funding is held at the voted amount.