Pacific Northwest Property Tax Expertise

Local Pacific Northwest Expertise with a National Footprint

As the economy continues to soften, the Pacific Northwest commercial real estate market has, overall, retained a reasonable level of strength. Shifts, however, have occurred that impact the reliability of assessed values to accurately reflect market values, thus creating tax-saving opportunities.

Sector Insights
  • The industrial sector continues to perform well.
  • The multifamily sector is seeing changes, but investors remain involved in the market with changing expectations.
  • The retail sector, despite showing greater stability, continues to evolve.
  • The office sector is suffering changes that reflect the post-pandemic shift to remote work and recent flurries of employee layoffs in the tech sector, which are translating into reduction in space demands.

Property taxes are driven by county assumptions of market (assessed) values and represent a significant operating expense for property owners and tenants. It continues to be prudent for taxpayers to ensure assessed values are being monitored and managed to minimize property taxes.

The experts at Ryan have more combined experience and expertise in the Pacific Northwest market than any other firm.

State Insights

Each state has unique laws, policies, procedures, and market characteristics that the Ryan team is well-equipped to navigate and interpret.

Washington
In Washington, assessed values must represent 100% market value and are reassessed every year. There is no mandatory mail date for annual revaluation notices. They are received randomly throughout the last six months of the assessment year. Monitoring these values and associated appeal dates can be confusing, and taxpayers can benefit greatly from Ryan’s ability to manage this information on their behalf.

Oregon
Oregon’s property tax system has an assessed value growth limitation that protects owners (and buyers) from rapidly rising values. Recent sales transactions do not directly impact property taxes, and buyers are allowed to retain the existing trended base value regardless of the purchase price. There are still opportunities for tax savings by understanding the relationships between real market value and limited values generated by the assessor. Reductions of real market value, even if not to the level of the limited or assessed value, can still create “compression” and refunds.

Alaska and Idaho
Alaska and Idaho both have 100% market value standards and the additional challenge of laws that do not require public disclosure of property sale information. Ryan’s significant client base in these markets allows us to leverage the confidential information shared by our clients to ensure fair values without compromising competitive positions of individual clients.

There is no group of property tax professionals located in this market that is better equipped to efficiently manage and legally minimize the property tax expense than Ryan.

Contact a Pacific Northwest Property Tax Expert

 

Pacific Northwest Property Tax Deadlines

For a comprehensive list of property tax deadlines, please view our, please view our U.S. Property Tax Calendar.

 

Local Pacific Northwest Property Tax Resources

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Ryan’s Pacific Northwest Property Tax Experts

Ryan’s property tax experts in the Pacific Northwest are uniquely positioned to help organizations understand the complexities of multiple tax jurisdictions and their different approaches to valuing and assessing all property types.

Matt Poling

Principal

Matt specializes in the valuation, assessment, taxation, and exemption of real and personal property on a state and local level for his clients. On a recent engagement, he helped a client save more than $2.5 million over a two-year assessment period by analyzing its valuation issues, communicating the issues with the client and then the county, and working through the mediation process at a state-level review board. As Client Principal, Matt is responsible for the overall engagement and coordinates the interaction between the client and Ryan’s National Commercial Real Estate Property Tax practice. In this leadership role, Matt helps ensure that communication is prompt, timely, and well in advance of any deadlines and that all questions are answered.

Sandra (Sandy) Guilfoil

Director

Sandy’s experience includes more than 30 years as a commercial appraiser, which includes 25 years in property tax administration and consulting. Sandy’s previous roles included Property Tax Director for the Washington Department of Revenue and National Property Tax Manager for a global forest product manufacturer as part of 15 years in private property tax consulting.

 

Still have questions? Contact us now.