Canadian Home-owners Now Receive Property Assessment Via Post

Homeowners in Oshawa now get to know the value of their house by receiving a property assessment mail from the Municipal Property Assessment Corporation (MPAC). The evaluation is done by assessing the value of a home and then comparing it to those of other houses in its surroundings.

This evaluation of homes is assessed every four years in Canada and it includes homes across the province. The value of homes is used to determine the amount to be issued for property taxes. However, assessing the property value of millions of homes can be quite tricky, hence concerns have been raised about how the MPAC gets to have accurate data on the evaluations.

The Municipals director Carmelo Lipsi responded to the critics saying “in assessing the value of a house, it has to do with the other homes around it. Residential sales within the area is analyzed which gives a better understanding of what the value of a property in a particular neighborhood is.”

The evaluations are mainly done under five different criteria: the location of the house, the size of the house, the land on which the house is built on, “a large piece of land calls for a higher value”, the quality of homes structure and the age of the house/ current state of the house.

For the last criteria it solely depends on the renovations or repairs that have been done to the house and although most of the personnel doing the evaluation would have never been to most of the homes, they can easily tell if a house had undergone any renovations. Lipsi added that “we would know as a result of any permits that were taken out. All permits that are taken out through the City of Oshawa would come our way, and then we would take the right measures to ensure that accurate data is recorded.”

Another question that was asked was what if a house was overvalued or undervalued?
Lipsi responded that owners are asked if they could have sold their homes at a price that it is valued for in the past as opposed of that of its present value.

In addition, owners are asked to consider the real estate value a few months back.
When all these questions have been answered, owners are given the opportunity to take a look at the value of other homes that have been sold to make a comparison with their own.
Nonetheless, if this does not still satisfy an owner, a request can be sent to the Municipal for another evaluation assessment to be done.

Homeowners have 120 days to file for another assessment to be done which they get to pay nothing. They only have to point out the areas in which they are unsatisfied about or reasons why they think the value of their house should be higher or lower.”