Why you should hire a professional to file your tax grievance
Filing your tax grievance on your own is certainly possible and in order to do so, you’ll only have to assess the market value of your property, followed by filling out your Grievance petition and finally writing a letter in support explaining your position. However, in doing so we highly recommend that you hire a professional who can help you with it. While it’s not actually mandatory that you do so, in our experience we have come to the conclusion that someone who has a lot of experience in this is going to help you go through the process a lot easier. So with that in mind, here are 5 reasons we believe hiring a professional to file your tax grievance is a good idea:
1.You only pay if you’re successful
In general, professionals are going to represent their clients in a tax grievance complaint for fees that range between forty and fifty percent of the tax savings in their first year. For the client, this is a great deal. On top of that, you don’t need to worry about paying anything unless you’re successful. Therefore, the has every incentive to improve his client’s tax savings.
In the event the client is successful, he is going to take advantage of the minimized assessment for a very long time and be required to pay the professional a small part of the savings he makes in the first year. Depending on the lawyer you hire, some of them may charge a lower fee based on the savings paid out over more than 1 year (for instance, one example would be twenty five percent of each year’s savings for a total of 24 months). This is still a great deal. On the other hand, our recommendation is that you don’t hire professionals who charge upfront fees or professionals that charge a fee higher than approximately fifty percent of 12 months’ worth of tax savings.
2.Professionals can handle all the work on establishing market value
Establishing market value can be difficult when filing the grievance, but luckily your professional has access to public records, but also to info provided by the licensed real estate appraisers. He can also provide you a great evaluation of whether pursuing your tax grievance is a good idea and that’s because someone with a lot of experience in this can accurately gauge the tendencies of the local boards when evaluating various kinds of petitions.
3.Professionals are well accustomed to the Grievance Day hearing
Professionals can easily speak in open hearings and it’s highly recommended that you let one represent you on this day. For a lay person, the entire process can be quite confusing, but your attorney will certainly be able to successfully go through it.
4.It takes a lot of time to grieve your taxes
Tax grievances can be very time consuming, since they involve a lot of research, filling out forms, writing support letters and finally preparing for and attending the hearing. Therefore, if you think you cannot handle this on your own, then it’s best to hire a professional to help you with it.
5.If you don’t win the grievance, the professional can handle your appeal
If you’re not successful, then you should consider hiring a professional in order to help you handle the grievance appeal on your behalf. In fact, it’s highly recommended that you hire one to represent you in the first administrative hearing in front of the board. This way, he’ll learn more about the facts and use that information to better represent you, his client. So if you’re going to need to pay for hiring a professional anyway in the event your petition isn’t successful, then you may want to consider hiring one to handle your case in its entirety.
