13 Feb 2006
Pad to palace - $121,900 house gets $8 million tax bill

OK, this goes in 'Humor', because it's so outrageous, even though I'm certain that the property owner found it anything but funny. And even though it's more than indicative of the mess the Indiana property tax system is in right now.

A court decision in 1998 led to several changes in the way property taxes are assessed here, and it's been what's impolitely called a "cluster-fuck" ever since. Some folks have seen their tax bill quadruple, others have been cut by half, and there's no seeming rhyme or reason to it. It's a subject for perpetual legislation. Many counties still haven't finished the required reassessment (included Boone, where I live) and many others have had to go back and redo several times what they thought was done right once.

So this tale of governmental lunacy doesn't really surprise me at all.

A house estimated to be worth $121,900 was erroneously valued at $400 million.

(link) [CNN.com - Offbeat]

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