Should you file that appeal please make sure and ask for our evidence packet That does a couple of things for you if you'll write on your protest form that you want to receive a copy of your evidence Packet it will require me to get that to you and it also literally Handties me to that data. So if I get more information about your value I cannot introduce it once I've given you that evidence packet. So it's 100% in your favor It's 100% for free and unfortunately Some years ago, I'd say three or four sessions ago I could have given you all the sales information you wanted just any day over the week over the phone If you just call me Nowadays the state legislature has seen fit to enact legislation that requires you to have a protest on file Before I can give you sales information Anyway, once you get that information you're you need to know there's two ways you can appeal both from an equity Appeal or from a market appeal An equity appeal just looks at your property in relation to similarly situated properties within your own neighborhood Sometimes within your own subdivision. Sometimes it's a confluence of subdivisions and make up a neighborhood But it'll show you how your property is appraised in relation to all your other neighbors and if it's not a kilter with similar Similarly situated similarly appointed homes, and that certainly is a grounds for appeal If the sales that we have don't support the value that we've placed on your property a lot of neighborhoods I've been to have seen increases in their land value a lot of land values in neighborhoods haven't been adjusted since I was six or Oh, wait, that's no fault of yours. That's just off the law requires us I've been in this business since the property tax system was enacted in 1980 and it's always been this way The legislature requires a separate land and improvement value that improvement doesn't mean you made improvements to your property It simply means the improvement or the building or structure. It sits on your lot. That's all that means When you buy a home Generally, you get a price 150 200,000 whatever the number is they don't say 25,000 for the lot 125,000 for the improvements. It's just the package deal The package deal is here Our value the land value and the improved value Summed up together Must equal market value if it doesn't that's a valid grounds for appeal In addition to getting our evidence packet, I'd like to suggest a couple of websites that are free Redfin.com the really really really helpful website in San Antonio. It's actually a national website It's a huge database, but it goes down to the zip code to the street level to the neighborhood I'm sorry Yes, it's redfin Dot-com You've probably heard of this one also with the Zillow You might even get mailers in the mail from I'm telling them telling me what they think your home is for based on data in your zip code Sometimes that happens it happens to me Anyway does that information together with perhaps a competitive market analysis from your realtor or if you have a realtor in your neighborhood It's active that can be helpful If you're particularly a lawyer of a number of homes that have been listed for sale and simply aren't selling That's helpful information to folks That doesn't happen very often anymore Because we currently have just over a three month supply of housing stock in San Antonio in general a Market is considered to be in balance when you have a six month supply Typically takes 90 maybe a hundred days to sell a property Most of the time when I see homes go up for sale In my neighborhood, they might be there a day. It might be there a week, but they're not there three months That's for sure Normally, there's full price offers oftentimes see over list price offers and We oftentimes see Multiple offers on the same property should one fail So the market is definitely in the favor of sellers and not buyers at this time And unfortunately because the property tax is so aggressive in nature if you're neither a buyer nor a seller You just want to live in your house. It's really not that good for you Couple things you want to make and the reason I say that is as values go up generally speaking your taxes go up Even if the city lowers their tax rate, even if the county lowers their tax rate Attends not to come down commensurately with the increases in value, which is kind of what SB2 was all about Now I'm going to put on my other hat for just a minute if you'll just bear with me In 2014 the state controller's office came into my office and they Downloaded all of my data all of my appraisal data and all of my sales data The state controller is the chief revenue collector and estimator for the state legislature That's a matter of law there required to study every appraisal district every other year to make sure that the values are in Uniformity and in conformity and all that means statistically is is that they're not less than 95 percent of market value Nor over a hundred and five percent. That's a plus or minus 10 percent differential. I Try to look as poor as I can within tolerance in every school district Thereby for my poor school districts assuring they get the maximum amount of state aid and in my wealthier school School districts to make sure they pay the least amount of recapture to awesome to redistribute San Antonio is both a victim and a benefactor of that redistribution process It actually was born here in Edgewood about 35 years ago So unfortunately, I've been in this business that long I know that When the controller came into my office in 2014 the market had substantially rebounded in San Antonio and we had not And I got caught with 10 out of 12 school districts falling out of tolerance not one of them over assessed Every single one of them was under appraised according to the state's estimators. I Then had to do what I'm asking you to do and I had to file an appeal on behalf of those 10 school districts It took me about seven months everything had to be produced in Triplicate the state still requires everything in paper. They require me to give them everything electronically And I went through a tribunal not unlike an arbitration We were successful in every one of them, but what that told me is Not not like I didn't know but the state while it's prohibited from having a property tax It controls all the purse strings to the biggest part of your property tax When those senators came to town and wanted to talk to the citizens of Bear County and the other 11 counties They went to throughout the state. They were beating on the city. They were beating on the county about their percentage of the total tax bill If you go home and look at your total estimate of taxes or if you look at your last year's taxes You'll see that the state Because the state is responsible for free public schools is responsible for over half approximately 55 to 56 percent of your total tax bill so they were worrying about The 16% that the city and county might be adding to it instead of dealing with something that actually had some control over Which is how much they find public education to Here's something else I learned in the process of filing those appeals And I was somewhat aware of this, but I am uniquely and absolutely aware of this now Every time a major metropolitan appraisal district in the state of Texas including Dallas, Austin, Houston, San Antone I think El Paso is even included obviously Fort Worth is as well Every time those six or eight major appraisal districts raise values as we're forced to by the controller by the market Every time we raise values the state's contribution rate goes down That's according to the state's public finance education system The LBV has warned the legislature for two sessions in a row and they've chose to markedly ignore it If you go to Windows on state government, you can see on Glenn Hager's website The LBV has published 10 years worth of actual tax collected for school districts who paid and who didn't 10 years ago Citizens paid about 40% of public education costs through your local tax collection efforts The state paid 60% Before this year's reappraisal the state was paying 50. I'm sorry Citizens were paying 55% The state's share had dropped down to 45% Those are big numbers folks That's a number that most of you can't recover from In 10 years we saw the state's contribution drop 15% And that's 15% of 45 billion dollars not billion dollars in value billion dollars in taxes That's a real high-level view of why things happen the way they do In particularly in your neighborhoods As I say your best evidence is going to be to gather our evidence packet If you have not filed a protest and you wish to file a protest and get your evidence packet in hand You can come to my office tomorrow Or Wednesday, I think Thursday we actually start a scheduled hearing time But if you already have a protest on file and you want to come in and try to deal with it in the next couple of days You can walk in as about 800 people have so far It's a absolutely Not confrontational process. I have about 32 appraisers waiting to assist you I've never seen more than two people in line at any given time even during the lunch hour We don't allow everyone to leave the building at the same time So I would invite you to take advantage of that if you're so inclined Why is this important I've talked to you about some of the efforts on the state's part and some of the lack of effort on the state's part Most of what's going to pass this session is going to benefit the wealthiest taxpayers in the state of Texas commercial and The attorneys represent That's the only thing that's going to pass. There's no property tax relief coming The property tax relief is at hand for the state if they choose to deal with public school finance They have not I'll say said said this before I don't really care what party you belong to If not for Joe Strauss, it could have been a whole lot worse If not for the speaker at a house whole outburst things to be happening this hand to tell you I Will tell you this we don't even have a good relationship But I feel that strongly about what he's done and I've watched it all year long as I have for the last 20 years I've been involved in the legislative process trans going forward the real estate center of Texas A&M the San Antonio Board of realtors the Texas Association of Realtors the National Association of Realtors Shows virtually every major metropolitan area in Texas Continuing along this trend through 2020. That's not sustainable We don't have enough housing stock. We don't have enough lots coming out of the ground We have people living here with jobs for jobs and obviously driving up these values I Don't know what the answer is Except to arm yourself as best you can to control your own situation I was speaking to the councilman some years ago. I had entertained a local representative Who will go unnamed? But I had engaged him in a discussion about trying to create a circuit breaker Because there are substantial benefits for senior citizens. There are super substantial benefits for veterans and disabled veterans But if you're an average Joe who inherited a home from your parents or you happen to buy a home ten years ago Maybe you lost your job during the recession and you're just now getting back on your feet. There's nothing there for you There's absolutely nothing to help you in most states They have a state income tax. I'm either an advocate. That's not true. I am an advocate for income tax It's a lot fairer than what we have But the truth of the matter is it's a lot easier to apply a circuit breaker or a way to measure somebody's ability to pay Where the property tax? Doesn't care about your ability to pay. It simply says you own a property that's worth x and based on market value and Agilorum which is Latin for meaning according to value. This is a tax you up Sounds a whole lot like Caesar But that's the system we have it's very regressive I Commend you all for being here. I want to answer as many questions as I can I know they've set up a front mic here if you're embarrassed. They want me to come out to say so. I'll do that But if there are questions, I'm happy to start that now Yes, sir. Thank you Sure. I'll start Would you mind just explaining how we might appeal a land value in a neighborhood so for instance and I live in La Vaca and all the land values have gone up Mine was 28,000 last year and now it's 130,000 from 2016 to 2017 So I'm not sure how we would appeal that and I have friends who are realtors But if everything's gonna be uniformly looking for a compliment neighborhood something would be equitable. It just That's doesn't seem excellent question as I said Since the inception of the property tax the legislature has always required us Someone arbitrary to simply separate the land from the improvement value. I don't know why it's just always been that way You are not authorized to file appeal just on land unless you just have a second lot If you have a lot with an improvement on whether it's commercial residential multifamily some sort of structure I'm going to speak to your home from a sitting there as a home on your lot You need to look at that cumulative value You need to get our cumulative data on cumulative value sales in your neighborhood You need to contact those websites. I told you about if you're in La Vaca, I guarantee you there's a handful of Realtors that are very active in that area. They all want your business.  Do you have your homestead exemption? Did you have it last year?  Sorry Yes, sir Thank you for your presentation I have a smaller home house in the one for this It's a bedroom My tent is about 10,000 obviously has a little shop down there And I can find out I've got the most expensive home in the one for this one This is the one for this one But my question is When I protested I wanted to find out more information when I got into I wanted to find out What that information is I was given a kind of a rush of saying oh you have to come to the protest and they'll tell you that But that's kind of defeating the object I need to come before I go to do my protest While I count I only have like five minutes to do my presentation It's not going to work Help me find out Should I explain the evidence? Where did you come to my office? I came down last week I've got the evidence Number one Thank you for that question I'm very sorry for the response you got If you get the brushed off feeling from anyone on my staff Please get their name Everyone has a business card I don't care where they work in my building My janitor has a business card If you are mistreated by anyone in my office Please get their name So that I can find out who it is So we can address the situation Ask to your question If you will call me tomorrow morning I will have my secretary print out your evidence packet I've seen you dropped off the protest Yes, I did have the evidence packet But I need somebody to tell me what it all means How the numbers work I see In the evidence packet You recall I said there was an equity section You said you know you're the highest price per square foot in Monabista You have one of the smallest homes in Monabista The smaller the home Just on an economy of scale If you have a thousand square foot home A two thousand square foot and a three thousand square foot home The smallest home is always going to have the highest price per square foot It's not going to be the highest price popular But it will be the highest price per square foot If the lot values are the same And you have to distribute that over the same amount of square footage That's going to have a very adverse impact on how the value looks Most importantly I suspect in Monabista There are going to be the sales that they have of homes that are of similar size And quality of construction Your construction is your home Has your home been updated Very very important If you live in an older neighborhood Where there is a ton of remodeling going on In fact we have a lot of neighborhoods where they are frankly buying homes For a quarter of a million dollars Carrying them down and putting up an eight hundred thousand dollar house It's very important that you go ahead and document The interior of your home My home is very nice But it's twenty-two years old My wife assures me we're going to have a new kitchen before it's twenty-three years old And I send it as long as I'm going to have those guys doing that We're going to do the bathroom as well That's the best I can offer you If you have an older home And it's not been updated It's not been modernized It doesn't have all the stainless steel Marvel Whatever kind of tile people are putting in your particular neighborhood Make sure and document that It'll be very apparent to us And if you're still not satisfied When you come to your informal Please ask for an inspection And we'll send an appraiser out to your property Usually too But for your safety and theirs Lastly If you find poor shoddy treatment I'm almost never gone from the officer In this time of the year I haven't had a summertime vacation in about twenty-five years But I assure you I won't be going anywhere this summer If you have bad treatment Please come down the hall I'm at the farthest end My door's always open I'm the opposite end of the residential department The extreme opposite end I think that's an authentic building Every department has a manager Residential has four supervisors And an assistant manager And a department manager There's no reason you can't see someone Yes, ma'am I did my research I'm in LaBotte, too Two blocks away The land value's only doubled Arts went up between four hundred and five hundred percent Right That's not fair The question is And then I'd like to know If there's anything we can do about that Maybe a class action lawsuit Maybe a city can file a lawsuit Because it's a state Back together with Dallas and Houston And Austin and Houston and Dade Because I don't think we're in Austin Or also just in Jacksonville Is there any way to get an evidence package Without having to go to the office Because I worked from seven thirty in the morning Until set was three things I appreciated Absolutely As I stated initially When you file your protest If you simply annotate on your protest That you wish to receive the evidence pocket It'll be prepared and mailed to you In advance of your period As to the land value Two blocks away I don't know if it's part of LaBotte or not But I know that as you move further south The values drop rather abruptly Why? Because that's what the market seems to indicate Again, it's not just the land value But the cumulative value for those markets Just as you leave King William And you enter into LaBotte And you go further south And the lone star And other developing neighborhoods They have substantially lower values As you go further south That may change over time As we see a lot of property being redeveloped In the Lone Star District But each of these districts carries its own burden Of what sales were transpired That's the primary reason Hey, she is though He said, Lone Star I've been hearing about Lone Star being developed Just as I've been hearing right now Two blocks There are two blocks Historically only been raised 10,000 more than mine Now it's only 20,000 more than mine Sure So that's inequity If you smash the first square foot I can see that But it's obviously not Right And you may have a valid argument there I can tell you that Simply having doubled the amount of square foot It doesn't necessarily double the value Of the land Again Well, it obviously does Because he has the same size law I do And between the two of them That's, you know, 340,000 or 250,000 dollars Is the total value relative To what the property ought to be worth? Or is it not? You know, like every single one of us Got the exact same appraisal For our property No, I'm saying from a market standpoint Why the property is worth What they're appraised at The total value of the land I don't think so No, because, as I said The end here is anticipation Expectation of more development In our area Yes, ma'am There are three laws That have been adhered to them To build condors Right Okay Two of them If you put three years Right So unless The builders have The builders have already built that stuff I don't think it's fair To raise our appraisals In expectation of them Making money on them Well, I also don't think That it's appropriate That we would use a value Of land sales to be developed Into multi-family Or condominium property To appraise a residential lot item And so, you know, you have a I wouldn't say a unique situation Because it happens a lot In around the urban core Quite honestly all around The center of San Antonio But each of those areas Has their own specialists And their own folks That are more familiar With each neighborhood And I simply suggest You gather the data Not only hours But yours And come in And have a conversation As to whether or not You can do a class action suit I've learned over time The older I get Anybody can see you For anything Or nothing at all And so That's up to y'all I've I don't really know What exactly would detail I know that you won't have Jurisdiction to sue me Just on your land value Hey I'm the guy I'm the one you have to sue My dad hurt my feelings My best friends And some of my worst enemies It's just part of my job It's like being a gas flow doctor You don't get to pick Who you get to work on That is what it is The truth of the matter is I asked Barrack County to sue me In open court About four years ago Because all the appeals I have from commercial property Owners totals for last year 23 billion in taxable value Equal and uniform appeals Was designed for exactly The problem you're talking about For you to be able to compare Your home to other homes Similarly situated in your neighborhood And find out what the Disparaging differences are And make adjustments for that What's being done in Texas Today and it's unprecedented In the nation This doesn't exist in another state Is you take the very best hotel In San Antonio Anybody know who that might be? That would be the J.W. Marriott You take the very best hotel And you compare it to ten other hotels And you find the medium Everybody knows what the medium is Here's the high, here's the low Here's the medium, one right in the middle The J.W. Marriott Unarguably should be at the top But under this statute It's moved to the middle Because it cannot be assessed No property can be assessed In excess of its median level Of value Compared to similar properties Appropriately adjusted They've taken this law That was intended to protect homeowners And they apply it to the Best commercial property Now the six or eight properties Used to be appraised below The J.W. Marriott Are now appraised above The J.W. Marriott And they come in And spin off of that too And so the spiral goes down Down and down Except for homeowners Because you typically Your situation sounds rather unique But typically homeowners are not as successful At getting that larger reduction Simply because there aren't that big Of discrepancies in value There's nothing to compare The J.W. Marriott to in San Antonio There may be one other hotel But they lost their signature Golf course or golf tournament To the J.W. Marriott I don't know how you make up for that I know that the J.W. Marriott Second only to the AT&T Center Is always number one in liquor sales And sales tax collection Nobody in second place We haven't even talked about their hotel rooms yet That's just from all the catering And dining and lining and partying That goes on and off Any other questions? Yes sir Good evening Thank you for coming So talking about equity and treatment Can you talk a little bit About how a dispute might be handled If we chose to go with a consulting firm And pay for their services Versus me, myself, going up And participating? Sure If I may On a personal level I'm always going to treat a homeowner Better than I will with taxes Bottom line Most of them are attorneys Or work for an attorney firm Some of them are good guys A bunch of them are fired right out of my office I don't handle taxpayer appeals I don't really know how my staff feel about it I know that I don't like my Appraisers being too friendly with tax agents If they go to lunch with a tax agent I'll fire them We routinely follow changes That are made by tax agents with my staff Anything above 10% or a certain dollar amount Must be reviewed by a manager I want to make sure that I don't end up On the front page of the San Antonio Express And use by a person On the other hand Some of these guys are very effective They know how to gain the system The bill that is going to pass In the Texas Senate Senate Bill 669 by Senator Nelson Contains everything a tax agent Could possibly want So if you have a tax consultant The game just got better for you If you don't have a tax consultant Maybe not so much That's not an endorsement of using a tax consultant That's just the facts folks Not a legislator But I watch every single tax bill That's been filed I've watched virtually all of them Some of them were good bills Go down in flames And the only thing that passed Was going to benefit the commercial And tax agent represented properly Now, most tax agents Will offer to do their work for free Unless they save you something And then they're going to want to split Whatever the tax savings is If you have a relatively modest home Like most folks in San Antonio It doesn't make a lot of sense Because that's the property type That we have the most information on That's what mostly sells in San Antonio At the same time If you have a more exclusive neighborhood And a more high priced home You'll find that just a portion Of those folks are represented by tax agents There's a standing open records request For every change that's processed By the review board every day By virtually every tax agent firm So they're tracking every single value That gets reduced everywhere In San Antonio every day So that they have the latest Information for whenever the next case comes up That may or may not be your case I don't know But I know that's a very common practice And as a matter of law I have to respond to it And give them the data I don't know if that helps I think there was a lady in the back Yes, ma'am Thank you very much for being here Yes, ma'am Thank you for district 1 hosting this So I'm the lady who protests every year Just because I think it's the right thing to do I want to know if my evidence packet Of my cost changes I've reviewed like say the last three years And it seems like all 100 homes Stay the same Can I pretty much be assured That that's going to happen again That's my first question You know from an equity standpoint I can see how that's plausible Because they're going to The neighborhood boundaries don't change that much Yes, sir If you do have something that happens Where there's a new roadway A highway that separates the properties That could change the neighborhood School district boundaries should Can sometimes change The complex nature of a neighborhood Other than that it should stay relatively the same From a market standpoint That data should change Because I would expect not the same 100 homes or 10 homes in the neighborhood to stay the same So from an equity standpoint Yes, I would think that would be very plausible If that would stay the same My second question is All of a sudden we have an extreme amount Of vacant homes that are now being boarded up In my neighborhood Does that play a role in my overall protest Well you know it will And photos are worth a thousand words I would suggest that you take pictures Of those homes I don't know how long these homes Have been boarded up Or how long that's been going on But I'm really surprised Because we have four investment groups That have bought up over 4,000 homes in Bear County In every zip code you can possibly imagine From O9 to the Dominion To the east side, to the south side And various parts of the northeast side And they're basically bottom feeders Looking for, when I say that They're looking for distress property Whether they're institutional land If they're taxes owed If they're whatever reason A lot of people were unemployed Several years ago And a lot of people found themselves in a bad way And unloaded property These guys buy the property Bottom for cash As low as they can get it And they intend to operate it And create a 70-10% return Over the next seven to ten years So I know one group of some Is six homes throughout Bear County And this is a very common practice Throughout Bear County That's used to be everywhere But certainly I would expect That those boarded up homes Would have a negative impact on the sales That have occurred And we would certainly want to look at that In relation to what the values have been For how long this has been going on We typically maintain The state only allows us to use sales From about June to June And the target that being January 1 It's always your argument that January 1 In this market, that's a good thing for you Because since January 1 The market's still doing this And so You want to make sure and keep your argument As a relative of the brand The last quarter or last year You mentioned the power of the homestead exemption For ordinary people Okay And Councilman Trevino also talked about Stability in neighborhoods One of the things that we're seeing In King William and LaBaca Is the turnover of Single-family residences In two short-term rentals I do not mean owner-occupied Grandmas trying to pay Or tax bill by renting out the room I'm talking about companies Coming in or in businesses Out of those homes Yes A number of those Still have full homesteads What can your office do to help us? That's not fair When a business claims a full homestead exemption On a business property It places a plenty of burden on the rest of us I 100% agree with you And we can do virtually nothing about it As long as still the principal comes in The statutes have not been addressed To allow us To require them To reapply Except When it's obvious from your own role That a business is Owning the property Not a beneficial trust A business, an LLC, a corporation That should not be entitled To full property tax exemption If in fact the property has been transferred To a business entity That would generally spark a re-application request Certainly And I'm not kidding folks You can laugh if you want A lot of people write me every year And tell me X, Y, Z Doesn't live at this neighborhood anymore Doesn't live at this address We recently had a council member Or a candidate that was running for office Actually a couple of them around the city That didn't even have residency In the district that they were claiming To be wanting to represent We oftentimes get inquiries about that Any information you want to share with us We're happy to look at If you are a CPA And you have a residence homestead In King William or in any other subdivision Or neighborhood And you want to claim part of it As your office That whatever percentage of your total Square footage will be carved out And you will lose that part of your exemption Air bed and breakfast is a relatively New thing to San Antonio Been going on for about ten years Maybe a little longer in Austin That as San Antonio grows More and more venue-oriented Events-oriented I think that's going to proliferate And into different parts of town Not just downtown But it certainly is very pervasive It's an excellent question Something I've certainly talked to my staff about It's also something else That I always talk to Robert He's not only a council member He's a voting member on my board About the kinds of things That we ought to be talking to About If you follow Texas politics If you're a Democrat in Austin You're not going to do a whole lot If you remember Joe Strauss He's the speaker of the house From San Antonio That's a very friendly ear to him As I said I don't have that great communication In with him But I do know people in the community That's a very good point To be addressed That was another question about Class action suing the city Or the state And you know I'm all for that I'm kind of an activist kind of guy The venues are not really that great Because the state's not All that amenable to being sued The guy that operates My homeowner's association Which is Associate It's one of the largest ones in the nation Certainly in the southern United States Was Senator Corona And when he retired and went back To work in Dallas I talked to him about this equity appeal issue Not one of those commercial Property owners Who's 23 billion dollars they're seeking To remove about 15 or 20% Of the tax roll is a legend That we've over assessed them They're all saying they're unequally appraised I asked him Would you consider suing me In a class action suit Another associate subdivision There's literally hundreds of them In any community in Texas Any metro community And we had an ongoing discussion His general counsel and I for about three months And then all of a sudden They dropped me like a hot potato And so I can only assume That one of the big packs got a hold Of it and said If you ever kind of work in Texas again You need to stop this Business is very, very, very much The way property taxes work for them in Texas Next question Sure, I think I can hear you Sometimes you can't be in your book there But I have a question Okay, we have from March A banker first To mail the protest And we just write on here The evidence package How do we know What to put For our reason Until we get the evidence And the evidence package Will have comparable forms To our Let me just answer that question Because you're either going to be To mail that in Or you can protest on the map And I don't care I just need to be able to identify your property The address, the property ID number And your reason for appeal For homeowners I always say Check market, check equity Those are the two main things Most of the other reasons Don't apply Unless you're missing an exemption And if you have any other concern Always check other And then you're probably Because Why I asked about the evidence Package In our neighborhood where This house was bought And they spent an enormous amount of money Remodeling it And it was on the market for Around $50,000 Which is not comparable To anything In our whole area And some dummy paid $390,000 So How is that equitable? My property's deteriorating That's a very good question That's a very good question But if you have properties That are selling for A ginormous price in your neighborhood And you know that there have been A ton of remodels and additions And improvements made to the properties And your property While it may be very nice and comfortable for you Still has the original 30-year-old, 40-year-old Plumbing fixtures Pictures are worth a thousand words We can tell New tile and marble From 30-year-old Serena Do you just need to bring those To the informal? Yes, ma'am 80% of all appeals Are handled by my staff Do you see any opportunity Coming to us in the near term Or is there a process that we should do To try to get a little more equity On the way this whole thing goes Obviously the property owner Is wanting to be held hostage By what some of these businesses Attorneys are doing Where we own this small piece of dirt That we have That is just skyrocketed And yet there are no offers On that piece of dirt Just because they're developing a different property On a neighboring block Why should I pay consequences Of higher taxes on something That hasn't changed anything in 40 years I didn't discuss that property with you But as you guys mentioned I'm a little concerned I don't know if it's being handled Or in our commercial apartment But in any case We need to take a really good look at that And provide you the evidence that we have To support or change that balance I'm a little concerned about it To be honest with you I know Delmyra I know there's lots of parts of Delmyra That are very commercial I know there's other parts that are not so much I know that there are homes That are notorious crap houses I know there are homes that have more violations And I got follicles of hair But All I can do is offer to work with you And have my staff work with you And I don't see anything In the near future Short of working with our council And you know Robert is a very forward thinking guy He's got an open mind To a lot of different things He doesn't know a lot about property tax Because by law he's not supposed to He's supposed to hire and fire me As my board of directors does Adopt policy And adopt a budget And then stay out of my business And that's largely what they do If I am not a tenant They should fire me If I'm not appraising property appropriately They should fire me If I'm failing the study They should fire me There's a lot more reasons they should fire me But I've been doing this for 36 years And I'm really good at it I'm sure you don't think I am And maybe she doesn't think I am But that's okay I would rather Have a taxpayer sue me Even over a bad ARB decision And I've had this happen in Barrett County Where I've asked the property owner To just go ahead and file suit And we'll settle it out of court And I've done that If you have need To go beyond the Appraisal review board process And keep in mind The appraisal review board is appointed Nowadays and has been for the last Two or three sessions Four or six years By a local state district court judge My board of directors Has a matter of law Formerly appointed them Now they only appoint the chair And the secretary After this session they don't even do that So everything will be Done by the judge And I suggest You know if you really feel strongly about it That you ought to get yourself An application and fill it out I can tell you must those guys get paid Somewhere between $135 and $160 a day They have very long days Of listening to hearings For about four months out of the year Outside of that They listen to taxpayer appeals On a monthly basis Usually one day a month In December when there's a changing Of the guard generally speaking They sometimes Have training sessions That might be a day, day and a half Which you're compensating for If you're a member of the appraisal review board I don't even know who's on my board It's against the law for me to have Any communication with them outside of an open hearing And so consequently I don't know if they're taxpayers Or if the guy's just wearing a tie I don't know Yes sir, Jeff? Say I own a property On a different block But far away Should a Transaction Take place from That location Before it does not Affect My property It could be next door key It could be a mile away A mile away I'm not sure Every situation's going to be a little different If you're out in the county I know appraisals would go four miles away Talking about fee appraisals Because there's not a lot of sales Out in the county So depending on the amount of activity The closer to the subject The better we like it The more reliable that can be The further away we get The less reliable the day is The more you rule with them Nor is there a requirement of law To take another number of 20 miles away That's pretty unrealistic I don't know what could possibly be Comfortable 20 miles away But it could happen I mean maybe less taxes There isn't any standard There isn't any scientific Evaluation There's absolutely nothing scientific About appraisal And opinion And the truth There are statistical measures That we can use There are some common sense measures You can use in the selection And the adjustments of the comparables That are being used and selected Sometimes we make misstudies And that might be shocking to you But if I have 32 residential appraisers And 531,000 Apologies to appraise It's entirely possible We could make mistakes in some way And if we do, you better do find it Than your tax agent We ought to be fixing that mistake Before you went off the bat It sounds like a very crazy Unrealistic process If that can happen I'd have to agree with you But that's what we've been living with For 36 years Yes ma'am I did twice And the second time I got to that level The first time I did a whole lot of work And I looked at all of my Comps that I got in the mail And you know Took out the properties that worked Within my particular Neighborhood boundaries Because there weren't quite a few of those That would be used As comps for my property So I did all Of a sudden work And I went in to my foreign area And they said, oh yeah You're right, you're right And I had the three volunteers Across the desk And then the appraiser And so I had a good result I was very happy But I have to say That The mood It was a hostile environment You know, and I'm very polite And The appraiser, she was talking fast to theorists And you know And I can only imagine I've done so much work on this It's been quite a few hours Compared to someone who's asking You know, who has never done it before I just hope for them I'm listening to some of the questions I'm hoping they have a decent experience You know, and I'm not going to get And then in my informal hearing I went to That got settled there I wasn't as pleased with the situation But that was in a smaller room There was a young lady who was into my appeal And an older woman sitting across In this one room So it was this kind of interesting setup I told her the same thing about I got rid of the properties That weren't in my neighborhood boundary The young lady was, oh no You have to use those, that's just how we do it And I said, no it isn't I've already gone through this And then she would look up at the woman Across from her and then look down and look up And I had this feeling that she was Brand spanking you And she was hoping not to say the wrong thing But it was still I couldn't say anything Well, I suppose I could have But it was exasperated And I felt like in a dead zone And And finally I just Okay, okay, okay And tried to go another round But that was also hostile With this person telling me No, and I'm saying yes Because I've actually done this before So, bottom line Are people trained To Be hostile In this situation This is not a joke really I think it's like In general, you know I don't know, what can you say about The kind of customer service That we're getting or lack thereof It makes me dread My next protest because it's so unpleasant Well, I certainly doubt that How long ago was your formal appeal? Two years ago Okay, should have been better And your informal was last year We have had some turnover In the last 14 years I've gotten less than a 1% attrition rate But we have lost a lot of I mean, I'm crazy about this 36 years old I've lost a lot of old hands That have been around a long time Quite honestly, between 2004 and 2006 At five or 65 feet For not being able to get with the program On a customer service basis For every complaint I get like that Or Not even a complaint I mean, number one, I'm sorry But I literally have Probably a hundred Handwritten Customer service surveys that we ask for Every day Tax payers take the time to fill it out Or sit there and write me Certainly not discounting what you've experienced But here's the number one thing I'm in the building My two deputy chiefs are in the building It's a residential manager There's Tommy Allison Very of course, the more young man He's one of the three guys I think that can do this job When I retire Very shortly, I hope You can only listen to so many appeals Absolutely no one is trained To Be hostile The review board I've heard Can be a hostile Environment We've done everything we can to try to get our staff To be imparted into that But I have zero authority over the review board I can't fire them for bad decisions I can't increase their pay Or decrease their pay Or schedule them for work Or not schedule them for work But I'll get blamed for everything they do wrong And end of the credit for everything they do wrong And that's okay That's part of my job Everybody that sues me will have to go to the board And be so inexplicably unhappy They sue me That's okay That's part of the job If you have that bad experience I don't want anyone being threatened In my office Please ask to see Tommy If Tommy can't or won't see you Please ask to see the chief appraiser I've given my direct phone number Out over the radio, over the television I've given my direct email out I'm not inundated with Negative calls Or harassing emails So please, if you experience That Number one, as I say I apologize Number two, I doubt that's going to happen to We do have Probably eight relatively inexperienced people And by that, I mean they probably have Less than three years experience Nobody has a quota Nobody has a minimum number That they can do for you But if they exceed a number For the protection of the district As well as your integrity And their integrity We do require a manager to sign off On whatever they're doing I don't care how long they've been here That's just the bottom line It doesn't matter if their tax agent represented Actually, especially if their tax agent represented I want to make sure there's no collusion What's your level Any other questions? Yes, ma'am Please explain the reason for the taxes Over 65 Or 65 And over What do I do? I'll be 65 next year How do I do that? And the deadline Is 65 Well, April 30 Most deadlines are going to be April 30 as far as your exemptions go If you're over 65 I'll probably send you an invitation To apply If you have a Texas driver's license And I say that simply because They passed the law several years ago So I'm supposed to track everybody's address In Bear County Who's over 65 Or whose DMV report says they're over 65 As of a certain date You can qualify as of the date of your birthday Okay And so when you turn 65 Again You can go to www.bcad.org On our website Download the form For your driver's license Send it in Or you can come to the office We'll pre-print the form for you You sign it Give us a copy of your driver's license We'll redact all of your data Off of that driver's license But we just need to verify that you are Where you are claiming the exemption That you're claiming The over 65 is very, very, very, very, very, very, very valuable To you in San Antonio, Texas In no other major metropolitan Tax and jurisdiction City or county In the state of Texas Not Dallas, not Houston, not Austin Not Tarrant, not Fort Worth None of those places Have what we have In 19 Don't tell the truth I don't remember exactly what you said We passed the referendum The 65 and over exemption And the disabled exemption Essentially the same thing The same action for you to qualify For a freeze of your taxes As of the year that you qualify On your homestead Doesn't apply to any other property Now, it doesn't Protect you from future value increases It simply says If you are not adding to the square footage Of your home If you're not adding a pool or a cabana Or outside kitchen or making some other Other than normal maintenance Improvement to your home Your value can do whatever it wants Your taxes are frozen If, like in 2008 and 2009, we lower values And the combined tax rate And your new value ends up being Less than your freeze amount You always pay the lesser of the two You can go back up as high as your freeze Here's what's important Let's say that You buy a scratch off and you hit the lottery You decide you want to move to the Dominion For whatever reason you want to have Crazy expensive house Whatever the relationship was Between your frozen taxes And your market value taxes Let's say that You were paying $5,000 in taxes When you should have been paying $10,000 in taxes You have a 50% relationship In what you are paying And what you should have been paying For the percentage When you move to that Million dollar home on the hill Your taxes today would be around $30,000 But because of your 50% Relationship on your old Over 65 homestead You port that Or you transport it From one property to another Anywhere in the state of Texas Whatever the value is So instead of paying $30,000 It's very important As I say We track that But if we miss you You can still go back a whole another year From the year that you qualify Or otherwise you would have been qualified But it's a very very valuable Exemption And what makes it so valuable in San Antonio Historically that's always been Now we have a $25,000 homestead Exemption The over 65 adds $10,000 Total taxes That's the way it is in most places in Texas In San Antonio, Texas We freeze your city Your county Your school district and your community college district The only thing that isn't frozen Is the hospital district And the San Antonio River Authority Those are a minutiae Of your total tax bill You won't even notice So it's very very valuable here in San Antonio How you recommend it If you're married in Texas If it's your spouse it's over 65 And he or she is not listed on your deed Do you still qualify for it So Just keep that in mind You don't have to necessarily be listed on the deed As long as we have proof of your marriage Or you hold yourself out as being Husband and wife Or whatever the case might be Yes It'll be 65 and I'll be there soon So it does, is it still frozen You need to make sure you have that on file So yes it will be And just like your homestead You get 1 over 65, 1 homestead Per property Per couple You know last few years The approval tax has gone up Do you see I guess you don't have a crystal ball on the web The future is going to be there Could you let us know like the next couple years How do they look Not great I'll repeat the question He asked What do I think is going to happen In the next couple of years with Valities Do I have a crystal ball It's called the Texas A&M Real Estate Center And they've been tracking Sole property Properties available for sale Number of houses being built Number of locks being developed Number of people moving into Major metropolitan areas Number of people moving into Major metropolitan areas I'm sure So maybe somebody from the councilman's office Knows this, I seem to think it's 25,000 feet or a year Or a month in San Antonio It's a crazy number Right, so that's more online With maybe on a monthly basis And so with that Kind of demand We're seeing an unprecedented number of Apartments going up And we're seeing an unprecedented number Of increases in value For residential properties Simply because the supply Is about a third of what it should be To be a market considered to be in balance And so it's very much a seller's market Buyers Are not being forced But buyers are paying a premium For property In virtually every price range If you will I'm really not a statistician person I've got a lot of those guys that work for me But When you look at the median level of sales In San Antonio ISD Which is generally not thought of as The richest school district in town It had the highest Percentage increase from last year To this year In the median level of sales price That's not what the embrace of this could be That's what you and your neighbors did All over SAISD And so consequently Some of the biggest increases are inside of it 410 All the way around the center of the city Not everyone of them But more than none You have a popular question As far as the appeal What percentage of your appeal Are rejection ended? I don't know that I could Honestly say that 80% Get something But I will tell you this Around 95,000 protests Roughly 80% of the people took the time To come in Who were taking care of folks Got something and left Got nothing And withdrew their protests For whatever reason that protest went away No show rate People get mad And continues to go up Maybe that vacation in Papo Sounds better than coming to the appraisal district The bottom line is We have about a 50 to 55% no show rate Paying people to sit there Most of the time They are swamped Which is what made It seem less than The vast majority of the people On my ARB But I can tell you that They come from the same communities As we do from all over San Antonio They are all San Antonians They are, I shouldn't say that Mostly sing like nice folks They deal not only with homeowners But they deal with tax agents And tax attorneys who are hostile And I think there is Probably some reciprocity From my staff with tax Attorneys and tax attorneys And I don't encourage that I tell them that's above their pay grade That's my problem I'm the one being sued Yes ma'am You're being eee State mandated or 38 Chromal dated in section 2609 B of the tax If you literally Have to appear on the bottom of the notice Trust me, that's not my choice Anybody else? Yes sir so when I gather the majority of the complainers Thank you for being here majority of the complainers You go to a state elected official Not so much a county I've done this in almost every council district, any and I'll do it in any council district that asks me to comment because I belong to two statewide legislative associations. Any ten of you people, out of Ways and Means hearing, arguing about a property tax bill will be a thousand times more successful than I will be as a bureaucrat. That's all I am to the state legislature. I'm a pain in the backside because I can tell you the truth. Just like I tell them, they don't like it. Maybe you don't like it. But the fact of the matter is, I've been doing this for 36 years. I knew when this process worked and I believe it was maybe a little bit steeper to climb generally for the taxpayer, but overall it was a lot fairer to homeowners because it wasn't such a scam where corporate taxpayers can avoid property taxes.  I think that it's best to work from the ground up. Work through your council, work through your commissioners court. Chico Rodriguez serves on my board as well. All these guys are busy with elections and all that kind of stuff. I don't know how you'll feel about term limits. I don't even care. I just wish we could keep people in office long enough to know where the bathroom is by themselves. You finally get them to understand something and it's time for them to go. I'm not being an advocate for being a 40-year congressman. But good Lord. We just have very understanding. It's hard to get smart about everything. Yes sir? How do you know? I've gone down for almost 15 out of 20 years that I've done a lot of good stuff. What issue did I have? And I don't know if it's like a thought process with your people there. But when I go, I'll tell them who I am and where I live. They'll say, oh, you're good with that thing. Well, you know, if there are some very new homes in my business, there's some regular ones. Well, 20% don't even know that you can do it. But does your company, your people, take into consideration that my property is just a half a mile over from the intersection of the old ground? Well, okay, let's speak with them. It's rough. This will be year 16. I said, this will be year 16. Yeah. And we'll figure out what they come up with. And here's what I'm going to suggest. I live off of Hughdon and the post and speed limit is 45 miles an hour. If I was a cop, I would sit at the entrance to my gated community and get my quota any afternoon or any morning through a rush hour. I mean, until it backs up from 1604 to the entrance to my subdivision, which is sometimes a 20 minute wait waiting to get in the gated. It is just that. It is a speed plan. So I know exactly what you're talking about. Up and down Hughdoner, we have another kind of strange thing. We have walls. And people like to run into walls. If I had children, I would not have a home that backs up to Hughdoner. My children are all grown. But I suggested that they might not have a look at trying to find just sales and back up to Hughdoner and make both sides of those roads their own little neighborhood. I might suggest that you suggest that to them. It won't be the first time they've heard that, not specifically about Montevista, but I'm very familiar with the intersection of McCullough and the whole area. There are gyms that are quite a lot. I like lunch, breakfast for lunch, and I don't miss any meals, as you can tell. I certainly wouldn't date them in that conversation because it won't be the first time they've heard it. I try not to dictate the appraisal practice and try to talk to them more theoretically. I make that suggestion to you in all earnest because it won't be the first time they've heard that kind of thing. And I hope they realize that people who are going to do living in this neighborhood, it's rough because you're buying stuff that you can't go down here and own people. You know, you're dealing with plumbing that's 80 years old. I don't know if I'm retrofit, so there's a lot of extra cost that people in historic districts have to deal with. And of course you have to go through the revocable review board to make any changes. You're jumping through. Try what I suggest to them. It's harder to engage than in conversation. I don't know if it's been formal or informal, maybe it's always been the formal area that I've gone to. I don't use an attorney. I try to represent myself. It's my property. But I'm told you get to speak first, then we'll speak. You won't get to speak after we're done speaking. That's the review board. Fairly possible. I'm just speaking. That's not the way to have a conversation. When I was talking to him, he enlightened him a little bit. Well, he better do his enlightening while he has his opportunities. I was actually talking about my staff at the end of the world. And what I was going to suggest beyond that was if the staff supervisor is not receptive or actually might engage one of the supervisors. I believe it's like that. Yes, ma'am. I have several questions.  I'd like to know if I can have a comment. It's not my, I'm sure. I can. Thank you. Is this, is your office on Martin and Freel? Martin and Freel? Or Levin North Freel? The property is owned by several siblings. And the tax statement was always sent to one, one of the siblings, and at their home. Okay. And then all of a sudden changes. What would make, make it change to each individual? What would cost them? Usually the, either the bottom of some sort of document or written request by whoever was the last listed, whoever was the first person on the end of all days on the last day. Okay. How am I able to find out who? If you'll contact, There you go. Join the group. Yeah. If you'll contact Royce and Nebel, he's in charge of the mapping and GIS department. He's one of my assistant chiefs. And he'll get you. Yes. He'll get you in touch with, you can return the right way of 210, 242, 2413. Go ahead. Go ahead. 210, 242, 2413. 2413? Yes, ma'am. Okay. Another question is, let's say, let's say that we have a residential property and it has one, two, or three other buildings. Does the appraisal district have a right to call, call you and ask you what you're doing with the other buildings? We have a responsibility to list and discover every single taxable piece of property in their county. I don't know, are they business type properties? No. Resident. Okay. Then just trying to find out if it's residential or if it's actually finished out. It has never happened before. What would cost that, for them to call? Somebody saw it. I see residential properties in the neighborhood. In the 7270 district one. Yes, ma'am. And those properties have a lot of illegal immigrants and a lot of four people that write down rules. There can be a family in one room. They might have five rooms and every room is rented out to different families. Now, what are we all doing to look into that compared to a person that has poverty? And you're coming and wanting to find out what you're doing with that poverty? I'm upset, I'm angry. I'm not sure how the question was posed or why the question was posed. They called, they called. Were there building permits on the property? No. I don't know anyone in that village or in my office to be able to speak. Usually it requires either a taxpayer asking us to come out there and inspect the property or some sort of building permit or they're going to move the permit on an adjoining property that they saw. Because typically they go out, they go out with a common sense of properties in a certain area. And they may notice that, okay, there's some improvements on this property that we don't have listed. In the 36 years, I can't think of one time I've heard this, but I'm sure it happened. There's no concerted effort other than the law of the fires and requires me to sign a document before we turn the records over to the appraisal review board for adherence to start for me to swear or affirm that I have caused, or may be caused, a listing and discovering a law taxable property in our jurisdiction. To the extent that we do that, I've never heard of anyone doing what you just described. Which is not discounting what happened. I'm just saying I've never heard it. What are you all going to do with the legal immigrants that live like that or that purchase a property and have different types of families? Man, I don't even know where to do anything with the legal immigrants. As a matter of fact, if I'm on your property and you tell me to get off, I have to get off your property. That's the law. No, but I'm saying this. Them renting out roads to families and basically just I mean, I'm reporting all of that. If you are legal or real legal with your own property in Bear County, the Chief Appraiser has absolutely zero authority to tell you what you cannot do with your property. That's how to explain it. Can you get it? Can you call me and ask me? Ma'am, I've already addressed that. I don't know how or why that. It sounds more like both because somebody made a complaint about the property. Well, I'd like to find out. Sure. I'd like to get to the bottom of it. I feel, ask Roy, if you can look into that for a year as well. And I'd be happy to talk to him about that. And it was, how did I do this first? Oh, I just had a quick question. Training was good. Training was good. A hundred times a day. Can we use noise from the train as a quality of life issue we're going on? Sure. Remember what I said? Sure. You can see me for anything or nothing at all. Most of the people that live where the noise is are living there either because they want it to be where the noise is, they like the downtown location, or it doesn't bother them. What we would do then is take that argument and look at the sales that have occurred in the relevant time frame, hopefully in close enough proximity to have also been either positively or negatively impacted by whatever influences you think exist. And we would attempt to try to help you prove or disprove that. Yes, ma'am?  I'm freaking out, actually. I've got two questions. Okay, I don't get a tax date then until October.  How can I find out so I can prepare, you know? I'm sorry, you're lying.  But I always take whatever the values I might have on them, whatever I just paid for, because you have the best evidence. Right. The most prison cell price. Take last year's taxes and add whatever makes you comfortable. Maybe 3%, 4%. Okay, but it's a new house. Okay, so this is from last year. So what was the total... Well, you don't have to tell me. Use your purchase price at the land. And your purchase price at the new apartment. And I'm at least 69 last year. Maybe 275? I don't think that's going to happen. Particularly since the legislature be on local jurisdiction so much this year about not lowering the rates and that, which I happen to think are right. But that's how I do it. And you know, probably to home mortgage. No. Okay, so the cash. Gosh. My wife takes care of all these things and she always has a budget. Just like you had a budget when you built the house.  Over the land costs. Or whatever you call a project cost. I would simply go back and man, there's no way that the rate's going to be over 5 cents over last year. I just don't believe that. In a climate like we have right now where the legislature's still in session, possibility for a special session, as much impact has been shown to local jurisdictions long headedly or not. They still were the object of a lot of disaffection, if you will. So I would use that. And you know, if you want, that's just the best thing to do. I think it was 269 last year. I'm suggesting you do something higher than that. Combined maybe 275. Okay. And that should give you enough protection. One other thing you might also know if your home is paid off. The county has, I'm told, a payment plan where you can set up 10 equal installments and they'll treat it like a mortgage for you. And they'll take in money from you. Every month. So you don't have to write a $5,000 check at the end of the year. A $10,000 check. Whatever case may be. And I don't know if that's available to anybody else. But I think if it's your home, they certainly will do that for you. Okay. As far as finally, when did you move in? About a few weeks ago. Okay. Okay. We'll probably send you. Give me what it costs. Usually the title company don't do that. Okay. You can download that form up at www.fdcap.org Fill that out and make yourself a copy. Send it in with a copy of the driver's license. I should get it I think before before you get excited about it. Okay. I heard that Greg Abbott had said that the tax was unconstitutional that anybody else to your back and that he was going to do something about that.   He's in church. He says it's not going to affect the homeowners because the state of Texas doesn't assess a property tax. The county does. Look, even though a property tax is a very high, there are total incidents of taxation in Texas because we don't have a state income tax. If you look at the total incidences of taxes, we're about 44 or 45th in the nation because we don't have an income tax. I'm going to talk about that. I'm going to tell you because don't go anywhere together and do this outside. I don't think it's probably for another day. I'm just saying. I think they'll agree. Yeah. I love the way you say Zoomie. I think that's pretty cool that you said that. You really want us to, right? Remember earlier when we said go ahead and Zoomie? Do you really want us to do that? Really? No. That's good. Thank you very much. I have a quick, really quick question to understand the details. You said the property taxes are assessed by neighborhood but at some point in the neighborhood it could be by school district. Because there was a gentleman asking is it one mile to five miles to 21 miles, see it up, my neighbor, my son, the job. She was saying that across the train tracks it was a craze differently. So where we are, we're in La Baca but we're not in the same school district. I don't feel informed so I wasn't sure are we assessing my school district or are we assessing my name to neighborhood? Is it by what kind of district sons how? I know this is going to sound like online tea I promise you I'm not. For school funding purposes the state looks at it in a macro view by school district. But criminal districts are required to look down to the neighborhood level. That neighborhood may change from one end to another or one end of North St. Mary's to another or one end of Adelaide to another just happiness. Sometimes it's a man made change like a highway or a railroad or a waterway or a golf course those things can affect why people are paying what they're paying to live in a certain part of La Baca or whatever the neighborhood. We will be the best to show you the overlays of what we consider to be the neighborhood boundaries and that's not something that changes very readily that's something that we try to adhere to based on market evidence and if we've made a mistake that's something that can be changed that's something that can be challenged not in terms of a value or a lawsuit but I'd like to think at the end of the day cooler aspect prevailed because I've always been taught go up to the next level and I've already told you my door's open so I'm amenable to looking at whatever you think the neighborhood ought to be and whatever my staff says the neighborhood ought to be Okay, but for now we're being assessed by naming the borders as we understand the name to neighborhood to be in La Baca King William Montevista Absolutely I think we have about 1400 of those and we've got about 15 minutes and I want to be respectful of the pastor's time so if we could take another maybe two wishes or so question and if you don't get your question answered I'll meet you in the parking lot The sales data I'll be honest with you bad model the appeal process we used to be members of NLS NLS came down Texas is one of 11 states in the nation that in a non-disclosure state meaning as a taxpayer you have a right to privacy about whatever you paid or didn't pay for your property The National Association of Realtors sent a letter to the Texas Association of Realtors who subsequently referred to all their boards of realtors and said you are hereby prohibited from giving out NLS data which is copyrighted data to any taxing authority darn sure including an appraisal district sure we do have realtors who don't necessarily apply to all of your own rules and quite honestly I have realtors that have worked in my office next question that's me, I'm weighing it back I just can't, my hearing is so bad do I have a digital ticket for those of you yes, we can accept that digitally and we can share information with you electronically as well and you can yay or nay it and if you decide to do an online appeal and you're not satisfied with whatever we're offering you your next step is as if you had an informal you just go straight to the review board and you can make your case there we're still limited to whatever we gave that is true it works better because the state requires us to keep evidence of the news to the review board and not as a separate entity even though they're in my office they're paid out of my budget I can't hire them, I can't fire them I can't do anything to them I think this gentleman did can we include crime statistics street improvements or not improvements let me just suggest to you that you can include anything that makes you happy but the fact of the matter is those same statistics should apply to whoever the buyers and sellers are and so to that end I would like to think that that is already reflective of the prices being paid black problems being good at doing being William and the Bog is the pilot parking yes I know I tend to eat mostly over the bar because they have their own parking lot uh-huh I was going to ask a little bit to flesh out some more of the homestead exemption yes it was my understanding of what you said that it doesn't play that you just bought a house while January 1 and then 18 it has to be your principal place of residence that you occupy on January 1 of the first tax year that you're on so if you bought a house and we just moved in three weeks ago you wouldn't be eligible for this year but you wouldn't be eligible for next year something else now on January 2 you owe taxes for the whole year if you break ground on January 2 and you don't finish until April it's not taxable until January 1 for the next year a lot of this has not been through also state problem, not our policy I think that's all we have time for I am going to walk outside if you have any individual questions I'll be glad to talk to you I just wanted to say thank you on behalf of District 1 and the councilman for you all this evening we hope you found it to be enlightening and informative we very much appreciate the partnership from Michael and Mosquita to come here and have this conversation with you I know someone asked about the Nowcast Broadcast it should be online NowcastSA.com tomorrow late afternoon so you can you can revisit that so again thank you to the new president who's actually going to have Ms. Ramosquita out tomorrow about a half a mile from here at the Kindlewood Senior Center very accurate almost right terrace will be meeting 6.30 tomorrow 6 o'clock so if anyone wants a slide redo and maybe an opportunity to ask another question or two there's yet another opportunity to do so in our office always wants to be engaged


Legends, this is also new. We have the legends before in the previous versions but was for indicators and programming indicators. So now we have legends that applies also for data elements of a tracker program or an event program. So let me show you this one. And you will see how it looks like. So I'm going to open this. Okay, here we go. So yeah, for example, if the age I entered in other number, like say that I'm going to enter 90 and I'm going to the next field, you'll see how the legend is changed. Okay, so this is going to work as well for events and tracker work for both.


Investments imply putting aside your savings into equity, mutual funds, real estate, commodities, and business with an intention of capital appreciation, that is wealth accumulation, over a preset tenure, short, lead, or long, which is based on individual preferences. Investments are great tools for growing and accumulating your money. However, it is important to keep some basic things in mind before making investments, given that it is not possible for someone else to define your goals and choose a napped option for you. I will give you a key point test which will help you in your investment judgment. Welcome to Business Insights and Plus TV Africa. I am Justin Atadounia. My guest is the CEO and co-founder of Ice Town Development and Investment, a fast-growing real estate development company with five estates to her name in Lagos. Hassan is a certified real estate entrepreneur from Metropolitan School of Business Management, UK and alumni of Lagos Business School. He was recently inducted a fellow by the Institute of Oil and Gas Research and Hybrocarbon Studies. Welcome Dr. Hassan, he's now at the Business Insights. Thank you, thank you for having me. Yes, in my intro I just said investment could be short, made, or even long term, but then before you get into an investment you should be able to know what you want. But let's just start on a general level and ask this pertinent question. How does investments work? Okay, thank you for that question. So investment basically has to do with buying an asset or an item in order to make profit in the long run. So in other words, investment or in a layman term simply means buying an asset or an item at a lower price and selling at a higher price. So how that works basically is you look at the different asset class or investment vehicles available and you put in your monitor for you. Alright, most times we hear about due diligence and of course we need to understand what it is and why it is important for investments decisions. Okay, so when trying to put your money in any venture due diligence is very important and due diligence is an intelligent investigation into that asset class or that investment scheme you wish to put your money in. So what do I mean by intelligence investigation? You just don't have to use your own knowledge or what you think you know and finding out if that investment scheme is right or not right for you you need to consult the expert in that field to give you the sort analysis that's the sort analysis in that particular industry so that you don't make a mistake. Okay, let me just take it one step further before we talk about personal road map. For instance, you talked about hiring those who are very, very experienced in such investment fields. So for instance, do I really need to do that for almost any investment that I need to make? For instance, I am a small business owner and I feel that I'm making some sort of profit and I don't want to plough it back into my business for now and I want to invest let's say in some venture. Who do I really need to go to that can advise me if I should go into the capital market if I should go into mutual funds or if I should just invest in government bonds really? Okay, so the kind of person you consult for due diligence or to get knowledge or information about any type of investment depends on the investment class investment portfolio. We have the digital portfolio which has to deal with the Bitcoin, the cryptocurrencies we have the stock portfolio which is the stock and equities and the likes and we have the real portfolio. So for instance, if you want to go into a real investment you will have to consult people who are in the real estate field. You will need definitely a surveyor, a lawyer and an experienced realtor. Now I noticed from experience people going into real estate that consider inspection of a property as due diligence. That is not due diligence. Due diligence involves taking coordinates of that property and chatting is to find out what does the government have for that location. So that's the beginning of due diligence. So basically the choice of the advisor depends on the type of investment you are going into. Alright, moving on right now some experts would say that they need to draw a personal map or some sort of road map before you get into investment decisions. What does that really mean? Okay, so if you are looking at growing your wealth you definitely have to have a road map and this road map can be broken into five phases. Phase one is a learning stage where you learn about that investment. Please don't put your money in any investment that you don't understand at least 70% of what that investment is all about. Some of us will just see something and because a friend said he has done this and he's doing this, you're just going to eat with zero knowledge. Please don't put your money in anything that you don't really understand. So you are, it's divided into five phases. The learning stage, where you need to know about that investment, the activation stage that's where you start practicing. You start practicing what you have learned then when you now see that, oh, your knowledge in that investment is growing I'm going to expansion. You go into expansion and the last stage you go into accumulation and reinvestment. So it is very important to draw a financial map when going into any investment. In fact, what that will also help you do is that you will know your exit strategy. Every investment has an exit strategy. Don't just go in putting money there and just keep waiting until one day you wake up and you see that there's nothing there. For instance, the resistance that happened with the crashes that happened with one of the major crypto exchanges. So many of them are going to also go that way but we will not mention them. A lot of them are also going to go into bankruptcy this year. So you need to know your exit strategy with a very good personal plan that you map out for that year investment. Alright, let's talk about this exit strategy before we move on to other questions right now. So you are going into an investment with a clear core tab sense that you are supposed to make this particular profit or yield in this particular time. So would you need to fix an exit or some sort of a way out when that particular time is not really reached or how does it really work?  So it means before even taking or placing a trade you are automatically defining your risk and defining your reward. So the exit strategy is very very important even before you go into the business for instance those who buy real estate you know from the onset okay this property that I'm buying this investment property that I'm buying I'm going to hold it for the next 10 years because there is a map that has been drawn that in that 10 years there is this amount of money I make and there is this amount of money I need you know so with this particular property class if I put in my money in that 10 years time it will grow to this money I'm looking for. I understand. So right from the beginning you need to define your exit plan it's very important. Right still talking about financial outlay and financial outlook do you also need to analyze your current financial situation before going into any investment because some people feel that if they don't really have so much they should not be thinking about investment or some sort of investment decision where others might not really look at where they are at the moment they think they might need to get some sort of maybe equity or borrow funds to also invest how does this really work? Some people think that before you can go into an investment you have a lot of money to go into such investment but realize with time that one of the easiest way to raise money for any investment is saving where in a country or in a part of the world where saving culture is not really practiced but you know a lot of people before the money comes in is already spent so no matter the kind of income you are making or whatever the kind of business you are making it is necessary and important that you have a little percentage 10% 15% depending on your strengths and you will be saving it now saving is not actually an investment but is a key to going into an investment now when you save up that money you can then go into an investment that can or that that money can carry for instance you can start with stock you can start with stock if you like real estate you can look at developing locations and have potential and put that money there you have one million, save two million and that's safe until you remove it from your bank and put it into maybe land banking okay with time so your financial situation yes so that you can know how to get to where you want to go and saving is one of the ways you can use to get money to go into an investment and there are other ways you can use OPM or that people's money but is always risky to go into businesses that you don't have proper knowledge for as I said earlier because if you are not informed you will be deformed in person you talked about investment in the capital market you talked about the stock exchange you talked about equities there was a time I remember sometime in 2005 2006 the stock exchange in Nigeria was really in a boom lots of people actually invested so much in this securities but at the point as though it lost its value and then the interest or the yields were not really coming in like before and a lot of people are looking at investing in the stock market as some sort of an investment would you really think it's advisable right now if you were to advise to invest in the capital market this is a very hot question like you are putting me on the hot seat to give you a financial recommendation so what I noticed any kind of investment is that by the time it becomes news then it is already late that was in 2009 2006 when the stock market boomed and it became news a lot of people came in and put in their money and lost it in the long run so what happened is from insider information there are some companies that if they want to list for instance at let's say 10 nera per share they are calling friends close friends to a private equity placement and those ones can buy let's say at 2 nera now by the time it is listed officially and it became news some people have already made 8 nera per share so if those investors decide to pull out their money in crypto they call it rock pool rock pool if they rock pool then the investment go down so I will not tell you that this is the right time to put your money into stock or whatever your investment as I said earlier you need to know or consult people who are in that field so that you will be properly guided but from my little experience real estate if done wisely is a very good investment by whom you are still watching business insight and plus tv africa we will take a quick break we will have Dr Ismail with us we will return and we will be looking at him risk appetite and how you evaluate your comfort zone in a moment to join us again welcome back it's still business insight and plus tv africa we are looking at investment decisions investment plans and what you need to do before you actually make such investment this is Dr Hassan Ismail thanks for staying with us Dr Ismail before we went on that break we are talking about real estate but we will come to that in a moment let's talk about risk appetite some people would say from elementary economics we hear that the higher the risk the higher the yield or the returns as it were so how can you evaluate or measure your appetite for risk and how do you know what your phone actually lies so it is said that the younger you are the more risk you should take because you have a lot of time to experiment and do a lot of things but once you are from 31 and above you need to be cautious that's why you notice that the elderly the elderly people they are more conservative in their life so if you tell them there is an investment that can give you up to 20% return on that investment they are already like no I am not going into that so your age determines your appetite the younger you are the more likely it is for you to go into high risk investments with a high reward so before the pandemic a friend took me to somewhere in Leki they said they are into Porex a lot of us know them and one of them came and told us we could make up to 30% of any money we invested I asked some questions and I realized they are into the financial markets speculation you cannot guarantee the actual return now someone is here guaranteeing me a particular return in speculation so I told my friend me I am not interested but he went and put in I think about 5 million era and as you know the rest is history but thank God he is still young as a man is someone who is 60 or 70 years old you will run into hypertension so your risk appetite is basically dependent on how old you are the younger you are the more likely you are to take investments with high risk high return but in general in your portfolio you should have a mixture of the high risk, the low risk and medium risk let's move on and talk about distribution of investment you have spoken so widely and so elaborated when we talk about real estate investments but some people would want to have a basket of investments where they can have an array of various plants so how do you can see that the mix where you should invest should I invest some in real estate should I invest some in bonds or do I just invest in them low risk government securities just how do you consider the distribution of your investment okay so as I said earlier that there are basically three categories of investment and vehicles we have the portfolio portfolio investments we have the digital investment and real investment portfolio investments have to do with stocks, equities and bonds now in portfolio investments there is also they have different risk attached to them like the bond is one of the investments that have the low risk in portfolio investment then the digital there are also low risk digital assets that you can invest in one of the safest is the real investment which has to do with real assets like real estate commodities, gold precious metals so in all of these three you need to find a way to distribute your portfolio of both high risk medium risk and low risk now from experience real estate went down well a low risk investment with do a tech time to match all but is one of the low risk investment then government bonds and equities also thank you real estate let's talk about it for one minute a lot of people are talking about investing in landed properties or just buying houses outright and reselling over time but some people like a school of thought will believe that you need so much before you can actually invest them in real estate how true is that okay so there is something called tokenization which is which derives word from suchetization is breaking into small things just like case study of when sachet mick came into existence by cowbell so they discovered that let's not mention brands tokenization is one of the strategies that have been adopted into real estate and tokenization came from suchetization you bring a big stuff divided into portions so that people in the lower stage can have access to it so that same process has been brought into real estate where people can own or invest in properties so for instance plot of land going for 10 million error the developer can decide to partition it for 4 people 5 people or 6 people so for 5 people all you need to bring is 2 million error and you could own that property same also happen for houses you can buy a house worth 100 million error for the purpose of generating rental income so if 10 of you contributed money equally to buy that property you can be earning return the rental income from that property based on your contribution and that for that property you can set up an SPV a special proposed vehicle to manage that transaction so that your equity in that SPV will determine the amount of money or the interest or the amount of rental income you get from that property so also in real estate we are seeing a lot of tokenization by aspect of co-ownership in this investments alright fine as school of thought says that one should be careful of investing heavily in shares of our dear employers or individual stock is that true? that is very true I'll give an example there are some financial houses you can't borrow money from a financial house and say you want to use that money to buy shares of that financial house it's because of this reason because they believe an individual or whatever should not invest heavily in a stock in fact if you invest heavily in a particular stock it's like you are putting your ads in one basket so portfolio diversification is very very important don't put all your ads in one basket as I said earlier you should have a mix of high yield medium yield and low yield investments alright as we begin to wrap up right now would you say there is a specific time a good time or a right time to actually invest? yes there is a good time there is a specific time to invest and that was 20 years ago and the next best time is now so you look at your current financial situation and look at strategies or the entry points you can use to start investing in fact you can start investing with as little as 50,000 error depending on the asset class you want to go into and that can be true using some apps that can automate your savings so that when the savings grow to a particular amount of money you can move that money into an investment you don't have to have all the whole money in the world to start investment because if you cannot save one error out of your 10 error today if you have 10 billion error tomorrow it will also be difficult but what this will do for you is that you are developing investment culture or investment mentality which is also going to help you in the long run thank you so much Dr Ismail for all of the input and of course the insights that you have given on today's edition of the show we do appreciate it thank you for having me alright and that's the size of the show for today we urge you to make the investment until you have so much you can actually start small but remember there is low risk medium risk and high risk your risk before you actually invest thank you so much for being a part of the show I am Justin at Cadone Business Insight returns to your screens again same time next week bye for now