A seller’s market across the state has increased property assessments in Pueblo County by 15-20 percent, the county assessor said Monday.

“Home sales are good and it has been that way since 2017. It started a little bit in 2016, but in 2017-18, people have just been paying prime dollar for these houses,” Frank Beltran, county assessor, said.

“The office is seeing houses that are probably worth, realistically, $160,000-$170,000. They’re selling for $220,000, $230,000. You get some of these little houses that are 900-and-something square feet and you’re probably thinking they are selling for $90,000-$100,000, but they are selling for $140,000.”

A property tax is a tax on the real estate you own, including both the land and the value of your home.

Beltran said reappraisals occur every two years and this year is one of those years.

“The odd years are the years we increase values, decrease values or leave them the same,” Beltran said.

“Nothing changes in the even years unless it’s a new construction or something that was torn down or deleted or if we find an error.”

Beltran said the county’s assessment rate has decreased 7.15 percent from 7.2 percent in 2018, which will help to reduce how much taxes go up this year.

“It’s not a big decline, but it will help out because all we do is value. We value the property and when your taxes come at the end of the year, instead of figuring your actual value times your assessment rate to get your assessed value instead of using 7.2 percent, it’s going to be 7.15,” Beltran said.

Beltran said in some neighborhoods, values have gone up only 5 percent; in other neighborhoods, they have gone up 35-40 percent.

The collection year for 2019 was Jan. 1, 2017, to June 30, 2018.

“Those are the only sales we can look at for our 2019 value. We can look prior to if we didn’t have enough sales. You can go back in six-month intervals back five years. But we always have enough sales and we don’t have to do that,” Beltran said.

Beltran said citizens have until June 3 to protest their assessments.

“They can come into the office, call us or have letters postmarked before June 3 to receive any protest for real property,” Beltran said.

A protest is not a complaint about higher taxes. It is an attempt to prove that the estimated market value placed on your property is either inaccurate or unfair.

Beltran said Pueblo County is usually about two years behind the larger counties in Colorado to the north because they are larger, they have a bigger market and they are growing faster than Pueblo.

“Denver is still going crazy with these houses. When they start to slow down, we will still be going strong. When El Paso County starts to go down, we will be stabilizing out,” Beltran said.

“It will probably take about 6-8 months before we see any type of decline in values or properties staying on the market for a long period of time because they just won’t sell.

“We have one more reappraisal in 2021 that is going to be another tough one,” Beltran said.

For more information, contact the Pueblo County Assessor's office at 583-6597.

amestas@chieftain.com

Twitter: @mestas3517