Summary
holding that because the sales in question were "bank sales" and thus a factor that compelled the seller to dispose of the properties, the transaction affected the use of the sale prices as evidence of the properties' value for taxation purposes
Summary of this case from 125 Monitor Street LLC v. Jersey CityOpinion
January 20, 1939.
Appeal from Supreme Court, Albany County.
The property was assessed at $173,000 for the year 1937. The referee and the court below found the value to be $110,000; that property in Albany is assessed generally at 71.4 per cent of its value, and determined the assessable value of the property for the year 1937 to be $78,540. The valuation thus fixed is slightly more than the amount claimed by the owner and somewhat less than testified to by a witness for him. Witnesses for the city placed the valuation at figures higher than the valuation fixed by the assessors.
The appellants assert in effect that the evidence in behalf of the relator does not justify such reduction, and that the assessed valuation is supported by testimony of witnesses for appellants. The facts shown concerning the property warrant the reduction.
Appellants also claim that in determining the ratio of values to assessments generally in the city of Albany, the referee erred in refusing to give weight to testimony as to bank sales of real property. He gave as his reason therefor the fact that they were made by a seller who not only desires but is compelled to sell, citing section 240 Banking of the Banking Law, and Heiman v. Bishop ( 272 N.Y. 83). (See, also, People ex rel. Mayor, etc., v. McCarthy, 102 N.Y. 630.)
Objection is also made to the formula used by the referee in determining the ratio of assessments to values generally in the city of Albany. He took the total assessed valuation of the twelve parcels submitted pursuant to section 293 Tax of the Tax Law, divided such total assessed valuation by the total actual value of the properties as found by him, and thus found the ratio of 71.4 per cent as the rate at which property is assessed generally in Albany. This formula was used by the court below in the case of People ex rel. Hagy v. Lewis, recently affirmed by this court after argument at the September, 1938, term.
Order affirmed, with fifty dollars costs and disbursements.
Hill, P.J., Rhodes, Bliss and Heffernan, JJ., concur; McNamee, J., dissents, with an opinion.
The investment property in question, 67 North Pearl street in Albany, was assessed in 1937 at $173,000. The relator bought it in 1913 when he foreclosed his second mortgage. At that time there was $125,000 in mortgages on the property. Then it produced an annual rent of $6,000. The rental income increased from then until 1930, to $13,500. It is now leased for a period of ten years from August 1, 1936, at a yearly rental of $14,000 for the first five years, and $15,000 for the remaining five years. This lease covers only a part of one floor of the four-story building. Also, the tenant is obligated by the lease to make all repairs, and provide the relator with liability insurance covering the premises and the street in front of them. In 1925 the relator sought from the Albany Savings Bank a loan by way of mortgage on the premises, and in his signed application stated that the property then was worth $275,000 and that the building was to be insured for $75,000. This was before the building was improved and modernized. Despite this history and these facts, the relator swore the entire property was worth only $75,000; and his expert witness, his expert in many cases, swore the value of the entire property was $92,675. And thereupon the assessment was reduced in this proceeding to $78,540. This provides for a gross percentage income of approximately twenty per cent. Such testimony, findings and result partake of the nature of extravaganza, and should not be countenanced by the courts.
The respondents swore two disinterested witnesses, one the representative of a savings bank of the city. They gave evidence that the property had a debt-paying value of $211,875 and $221,875, respectively. These witnesses were neither impeached nor cross-examined by the relator. They but confirmed in a marked degree the values which the relator himself placed on the property by his earlier conduct when the question of taxes was not pressing. The presumption of the correctness of the assessment is abundantly supported by the evidence produced from witnesses on both sides.
The method used by the referee and the Special Term to compute the ratio which the full value of property in Albany bears to the assessed value, is arithmetically wrong. The result sought is one of average percentage. The average per cent should be found by averaging percentage, not lump values and lump assessments. The error was further discussed in the dissent in People ex rel. Hagy v. Lewis ( 255 App. Div. 916).
The order should be reversed, and the assessment sustained, with costs.