conducted by Alan S. Dornfest, AAS, Property Tax Policy Supervisor,
Idaho State Tax Commission, Boise, Idaho
1. Your jurisdiction: State agency or Provincial agency or Local jurisdiction or
Other (please describe):
2. How often does your jurisdiction conduct ratio studies? Annually or More frequently or
Every years.
3. Who conducts your ratio study? (please check all that apply) State or province officials or
Local officials or University or private company under contract or
Other (please explain)
4. Which of the following does your ratio study include? Sales only or Appraisals only or
Both sales and appraisals
a. If you use both sales and appraisals, do you combine them in studying one type or category
of property? Yes or No Please explain:
b. If sales are used in the ratio study, which jurisdiction performs the sample selection?
State or province or Local
c. Which jurisdiction conducts the sales validation? State or province or Local
5. Are business or commercial machinery and equipment considered taxable personal property
in your jurisdiction? Yes or No
a. If yes, is a ratio study conducted for such personal property? Yes or No
b. If yes to (a.) above, which of the following does your personal property ratio study involve?
Sales only orAppraisals only or Both sales & appraisals
c. If you use both sales and appraisals, do you combine them in studying one type or category
(e.g., vehicles, machinery) of property? Yes or No
Please explain:
d. How are the results of your personal property ratio study used?
e. If you use appraisals, what techniques does your jurisdiction use? (Please check all that apply)
Depreciation or economic life tables, Iowa curves Other (Please list):
6. Regarding intangible personal property:
a. Do you have a statutory exemption for intangible personal property? Yes or No
b. If yes, which types of property would receive this exemption? (please check all that apply)
Capital stock, Bonds, Deposits, Contracts and contract rights, Copyrights,
Custom computer programs, Customer lists, Goodwill, Licenses, Patents,
Rights-of-way, Trademarks, Trade Secrets,
Other (please list):
7. Does your jurisdiction audit appraisal procedures of any class or category of property in lieu
of a ratio study? Yes No
a. If yes, for which categories:
b. Does your jurisdiction use procedural audits in addition to ratio study information to determine
compliance? Yes No
c. Can equalization or reappraisal be ordered as a result of such audits? Yes No
8. Regarding sales price disclosure and recordation:
a. Does your jurisdiction have a law requiring disclosure of real estate sales prices to assessment
officials?YesNo If yes, is disclosure made tostate/provincial orlocal assessors orboth?
b. Does the sale price disclosure occur at deed recording or within a statutory period of time
(e.g., 30 days) or Other (please explain):
c. Is a method in place to track a disclosure document for every recorded sale? Yes No
d. Please select the type of disclosure document used: Sale Price Statement orComprehensive
Questionnaire or Both or Other (please explain):
e. Is the disclosed sale price confidential in the jurisdiction to which disclosure was made?YesNo
f. Do you charge a value related fee (e.g., transfer tax, deed stamp) for real property transfers?
Yes No If so, please describe (include rate(s)):
g. Does your jurisdiction have a law making recordation mandatory for real property transfers?
Yes No If yes, at what level does recordation occur, state/provincial or local
assessors or both?
h. Are there legal penalties in place for falsifying information on the sales disclosure document? Yes
No
9. If a sale is verified to be a valid arm’s length market value transaction and is to be used in your ratio study,
do you adjust the sale price for any of the following? Yes No
If you adjust, approximately what percentage of the sales in a typical ratio study are adjusted? (click all
that apply)
Time % of Sales
Financing % of Sales
Personal Property % of Sales
Closing Costs % of Sales
Brokerage fees % of Sales
Intangibles % of Sales
Other % of Sales Please describe:
10. Are blanket or global adjustments made to sales prices prior to computing ratios? (For example,
some jurisdictions adjust all prices down by 1% in an attempt to adjust for personal property that is
difficult to isolate sale by sale; others adjust by 10% for financing considerations.) Yes No
a. If yes, please describe types of adjustments and indicate the maximum adjustment generally
permitted by this procedure:
b. Are there any court cases in your jurisdiction affirming or disallowing these blanket
adjustments?YesNo If yes, please give citation:
11. For which of the following purposes is your ratio study used? (click all that apply)
To order adjustments to locally determined assessed values.
To equalize state or provincial funding of local jurisdictions.
To order local jurisdictions to reappraise.
To advise provincial, state, or local jurisdictions of assessment conditions.
To assist mass appraisals programs.
To adjust or equalize centrally determined assessed values (such as utilities)
12. If you use your study to adjust or to order adjustment to locally determined assessed values, which of the following procedures is used?
Order local officials to apply trending factors to individual classes or categories of property.
Trend all types of property equally, based on a jurisdiction-wide factor.
Give local officials a grace period to comply with indicated factors.
13. Regarding assessment uniformity:
a. Do you have specific standards or requirements for assessment uniformity as measured by the
COD (Coefficient of Dispersion) or COV (Coefficient of Variation)? (These may be statutory
or procedural, but in either case would be used to find jurisdictions in or out of compliance.)
Yes No If yes, please insert any differences your jurisdiction may have from the '99 IAAO
Standards:
b. Do you have standards for price related bias (vertical inequity) as measured by the PRD (Price
Related Differential) or other statistical tests? Yes No
c. Can your jurisdiction initiate any action as a result of assessment uniformity conditions?
Yes No If yes, please check all actions that apply: Order reappraisal,Withhold
funding (e.g., revenue sharing),Other action (please describe):
d. If you answered Yes to 13 (c) above, do you calculate reliability measures, such as confidence
intervals, on uniformity statistics around the COD or the PRD or Both?
e. If you initiate action as a result of assessment uniformity, is such action dependent upon
point estimates or interval estimates?
14. Testing assessment level:
a. Do you have an assessment level standard that allows some amount of variance from your
statutorily required assessment level?YesNo If yes, please click on your amount of
variance permitted:± 10%, or± 5%, or Other (please specify):
b. If yes, is this variance set by statute? Yes No If no, please click on the legal authority:
administrative rule, or Other (please describe):
c. If you use your ratio study to test assessment level compliance, are allowances made for sample
reliability using statistical tests such as confidence intervals? Yes No Please explain:
d. Please check the measures of level you calculate and those you may use for equalization:
Measure
Calculate
Equalization
Arithmetic Mean
Median
Weighted (aggregate) mean
e. Do you test the distribution of ratios to see if it is statistically normal? Yes No
If yes, how would this determination affect the measure(s) of level listed above that would be
used for testing compliance or equalization? Please explain:
15. Testing reliability:
a. Is statistical compliance with standards for appraisal level based on point estimates or
confidence intervals?
b. If yes, which test(s) do you use? 95% level of confidence, or 90% level of confidence,
or Other level of confidence (please describe):
c. Assume that there is a legal requirement for assessments, as measured by the ratio study sample
mean to fall between 90% and 110% of market value. An equalization order could be issued if
the standard is not met. A study sample has a mean ratio of 85% and a 95% confidence interval
between 75% and 95%. Would you rule this result in compliance with statutory assessment level
requirements?
No, only point estimates are used to make inferences about compliance, or
Yes, the confidence interval overlaps the threshold for compliance.
d. How would you revise the response to question 15.b. above if the sample COD (or other measure
of uniformity) showed very poor uniformity? Please check all that apply: No change,
May lower the level of confidence, May use the point estimate only to evaluate level,
May review level measures from previous years, orMay use additional information,
such as sample size, to make a final determination.
16. Do you appraise any non-agricultural property at 100% of current market value (full cash value)?
Yes No Only the interest sold
a. Do you appraise all property as a constant base year (e.g., 1990)? Yes No If yes, what year
is used?
Is property that is not required to be appraised during a given year required to have its value updated
during such interim year? Yes No Please explain how your appraisal and valuation update
cycles work:
b. Can your local jurisdictions establish different assessment ratios? Yes No If yes, please explain:
c. What is the state or provincial statutorily set assessment ratio for the major types of property?
Type of Property
Your Jurisdiction's Ratios
Residential
100% of Market Value? Yes No
If no, please enter your ratio %
Farmland
If no, please enter your ratio or indicate Use Value
Commercial
Industrial
Utilities
Personal
Railroads
Minerals
Other Type:
17. Regarding ratio study samples:
a. Within any property type do you stratify your sample? Yes No If yes, by:
Range of values? Yes No
Geographic neighborhood?Yes No
School District? Yes No
City? Yes No
County? Yes No
Other factors? Yes No If yes, please list:
b. What is the smallest sample you will use to evaluate any category of property? less than 5, or
5 to 9, or 10 to 19, or 20 to 30, or greater than 30, other (please specify):
c. Do you establish any sample size quotas or goals (e.g., 3% of parcels in category or number based
on statistical sample size formula)?Yes No If yes, please explain how are these established?
d. Do you identify outlier ratios? Yes No If yes, how do you determine if a ratio is an outlier?
e. What action do you take if you determine a sample includes outliers?
f. Do you attempt to determine how representative the sample is? Yes No
If yes, please check all that apply to your procedure:
Stratify by geographic area
Stratify by property class
Stratify by value range
g. Are fixed trim points (such as all ratios below 50% or above 200%) set to automatically remove outliers?
Yes No
h. Is there a limit on the percentage of sales that can be trimmed out of a sample? Yes No
If yes, please enter the %:
18. Do you have statutory requirements to check for sales chasing? Yes No
If yes, please describe your procedure for testing and correcting:
19. Can a taxing district or third party initiate legal action as a result of your jurisdiction’s ratio study?
Yes No If yes, please describe:
The Idaho State Tax Commission would like to thank everyone who responded to our Ratio Study Survey. Your time and expertise were greatly appreciated. Thank you.