Owen Charles, Baltimore City Supervisor of Assessments has been very helpful to us recently.
Maryland is a strange beast when it comes to property tax assessments, but the patient man answered all our questions. He’s the one that explained to us the Maryland Homestead Tax Credit, making that complicated system seem simple.
He also explained to us why Baltimore and the rest of Maryland have such a high number of overassessed properties.
“In Maryland, we reassess properties every three years, but we do it in phases, so in any one year only a third of properties are being reassessed. The people that were reassessed 3 years ago may have a higher assessed value since the real estate market was higher then.”
Maryland property tax law has another quirk, homeowners can appeal their property tax assessment any year they think their assessment is out of date or incorrect. With that in mind, if your assessment was done a year or two ago, it’s probably time to investigate and figure out if you can lower your tax bill.
