Property-tax bills have all gone out, and King County Assessor Lloyd Hara is out making the rounds to explain why his office is more than just the place that sends you those bills. He visited West Seattle in the Monday morning sunshine:
![](https://westseattleblog.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/haravisit.jpg)
(Photo by WSB co-publisher Patrick Sand)
In a chat with WSB, Hara shared some stats:
-Median assessed value in West Seattle for last year (half of the properties are worth more, half worth less): $448,600
-That’s down almost 7 percent from the previous year’s $481,300 median assessed value
-This year’s tax rate per $1,000 of assessed value is $10.17, up from last year’s $9.66
-Breakdown of where your property taxes go: 53 percent schools, 27 percent “local government,” 18 percent King County, 2 percent Port of Seattle
That brings in the question “My property values decreased, so why did my property tax increase?” Hara’s office explains: “Washington is one of two states that has a revenue-based system of taxation: Taxing districts, such as fire, library and school districts, submit their annual adopted budgets to the Assessor, who has the responsibility to determine the “levy rate” that is necessary to meet the adopted budgets.”
His office has noticed trends including the resurgence in new construction, and the fact that “neighborhoods closer to the urban core have retained value better than outlying areas of the county.”
And as Hara makes the rounds – before our chat, he had met with the team at Windermere West Seattle – he’s highlighting some of his office’s changes, such as residential appraisers field-testing iPads, handy for a variety of reasons including the built-in camera and the fact they can synch up with the office – the more mobility, the more productivity, they believe. They’re also “developing a native iPad application for field-data collection.” Plus, the Assessor’s Office says iPad use “will save $250,000 in hardware-replacement costs.”
Also on the tech front, they want to be sure you know about all the online lookup tools they have available – starting here. (Personally, we’re partial to the Parcel Viewer, which can tell you who owns a particular piece of property, as well as other info such as its value, past sales, and more.)
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