Property taxes are definitely a concern when selling a home in Indianapolis. The assessments often do not make sense as stated by Tony.

When calculating any decrease in property value, based purely on taxes, you would have to narrow it down to individual neighborhoods. Or, at least, I would. There is really not a standard for Townships.

Since you specifically asked about Meridian-Kessler and/or Washington Township, I ran a few statistics for sales in Washington Township for 2004 and 2007.

In 2004, before the new assessment, the averages were:

2 bedroom, 2 bath with 1768 sq. ft.

Average sales price was $180,840

Average days on market were 65

For 2007, The averages were higher, though, not much.

2 bedroom, 2 bath, with 1728 sqaure ft.

Average sales price was $187,391

Average days on market were 82

As you can see, the averages indicate an increase and it is taking about 20 days longer to sell. These numbers will change as you narrow down to specific neighborhoods.

If you would information about specific neighborhoods, I'd be happy to research the data for you.

Paula Henry
ReMax Excel

Thu May 1 2008, 11:01

This is a great question. Thanks. I hope it stimulates conversation. As we all know Indiana has been all over the place with property taxes. The latest law now has owner-occ properties at 1% of assessed value. Now it has been my experience that assessed vs. appraised never matches or makes sense. I did not write these rules. They are what they are.
Since the state has just spent a bunch of money re-assessing the state I do not see them doing it again. My best advise is to look at your latest assessment mult. by 1% and hope it is something that you could manage.
Now my day job is to help Happy Hoosiers with finding money to purchase or refinance homes. I can help with all of your questions. If things are tight, rates are great and working together we may come up with a way to save you some money. Check me out on my website.
Have a great day!
Tony Grego - Indiana Mortgage Company

Thu May 1 2008, 06:44