Deadline Approaching to Apply for 2010 Property Tax Reduction.

Small Consolation.

If there's any silver lining in having the value of your property drop with the declining economy, it's that you might qualify for a reduction in your property taxes.  Now this may seem like old news, since the County of San Mateo took the unprecedented step two years ago of automatically reassessing the value of nearly 40,000 homes in county and automatically lowering some homeowner's tax liability.

But despite this proactive effort, there are some San Carlos homeowners who didn't “feel the love” from the County on that go-around, even though they are convinced the value of their home has dropped.   Not a problem.   The San Mateo County Assessor's Office makes it pretty easy to apply at any time for a reduction in your property tax liability — you can either do it in person at the County offices, mail it in, or fill-in a simple one page form on their website at your leisure.

February 15th Deadline.

It was while I was tracking down this website address for a blog reader that I noticed the following alert on the County website: “We are accepting applications for the 2010-11 and 2011-12 tax years at this time. The period to submit for the 2010-11 will end February 15, 2011.”  So if you think you qualify for a property tax reduction in the most recent tax year, you now have something to do this coming weekend.

Here's page on the assessor's site:  Decline in Value Request Form.    It's a small consolation if the value of your home has indeed dropped.  But money is money…and every bit helps.