Sacramento-area homeowners can expect property tax cuts

The Sacramento Bee reports:

Nearly 180,000 Sacramento-area homeowners can expect millions of dollars in collective property tax cuts this fall as county assessors engage in a wholesale markdown of home values.

Assessors say the tax cuts may reach $104 million or more in the eight-county capital region – and primarily benefit people who bought homes in 2004 and afterward.

The wide-scale reassessments will enable owners with declining home values to keep more of their personal income as intended under Proposition 8, an initiative passed in 1978 that, among other things, requires reassessments when a home's value falls below its purchase price.

The new assessments will also sharply trim budgets for school districts, cities and counties and special districts during the 2008-09 fiscal year, which begins July 1.

This marks the second consecutive year assessors in Amador, El Dorado, Nevada, Placer, Sacramento, Sutter, Yolo and Yuba counties have put residential property taxes under review. The reassessments come as mounting foreclosures and a massive inventory of discounted bank-repossessed homes have sharply depressed values.

You see who really wants higher and higher real estate prices:local government.