A letter like this is telling New Castle County property owners their “new tentative assessed value.”
Homeowners throughout New Castle County have just received property reassessment letters giving them the “new tentative assessed value” of their property. And they’re mostly upset, judging from comments on Facebook, because the change is huge and they fear their taxes will go up as much.
That’s wrong.
“The tax rate will decrease; therefore, DO NOT multiply your new tentative assessed value by the current tax rate,” the letter writes in bold, with more emphasis in underscored all-caps. “The new tax rate will be determined by each taxing authority in 2025.”
The county has promised that the new rate will be revenue-neutral, meaning that the overall taxes collected will not go up or down because of their property reassessment. However, the tax bills for individual properties could go up or down.
Still, people are upset. Printable comments from Facebook include “Totally unbelievable!,” “That’s insane,” and “This is so messed up.”
The county said all property owners should receive the letter with the new values by Nov. 22.
They then have two weeks to appeal the new tentative assessed value by scheduling an appointment online or calling 855-670-2658.
The county will certify final values in March, and the updated assessed values will go into effect in July.
The county’s annual tax bill lumps together multiple taxes. Unincorporated parts of the county include county property, crossing guard, light, school district, and vocational. School taxes accounted for 76% of the 2024-25 bill for unincorporated areas.
Property reassessment letter tries to mitigate concerns
The new letter twice more uses NOT in bold all-caps to emphasize that “the previous assessed values were NOT a factor” in developing the new tentative assessed values and that the new values also do NOT reflect any tax exemptions.
The reassessment was triggered by a lawsuit against all three Delaware counties, which the counties lost.
“Reassessments cannot be used for a ‘back door’ tax increase,” according to Joseph Fulgham, director of policy & communications for the House of Representatives Republican Caucus.
“As properties are reassessed at their new valuations, county and school district tax rates will be adjusted to collect approximately the same total revenue after the assessment. However, under state law, the county’s total tax collection can increase up to 15%, while the school district’s total collections are limited to a 10% increase.”
New Castle County hired Plano, TX-based Tyler Technologies, which has been in business since 1938 and whose nearest office is in Trenton, NJ, to handle the reassessment of about 215,000 properties.
This summer, owners of residential properties received letters to confirm characteristics of their parcels notated during exterior inspections. About 11,000 mailers were returned with changes, according to Michael McFarlane, Tyler’s manager of Southern Appraisal Region & Consulting Services
At this stage, “industry standards suggest an appeal rate between 5-10% is customary,” he said. “As such, Tyler is planning for as many as 21,500 informal value hearings.”
As of Tuesday morning, about 450 requests for such informal value hearings have been made, he said. These hearings, according to the letter, will involve only fair market value. Tyler staff “will not be able to discuss tax rates or estimated tax bills.”
