Board partly grants appeal for Hooten Hill home, reduces 2025 assessment after members weigh neighborhood impacts

Michelle Evans appealed the borough’s 2025 assessed value for her Hooten Hill/Dubia Road property, arguing the property’s immediate surroundings — salvage, piled vehicles, poor road access and related neighborhood conditions — reduce marketability and should lower tax assessment. Evans told the board she did not permit an interior inspection and focused her case on outside factors and comparative market evidence of nearby properties.

Assessing staff presented sales- and assessment-based comparables across North Pole and the nearby Helensdale/VFW neighborhoods and said the assessor had removed a previously applied 20% economic-location adjustment in 2025 after reviewing the broader market. Appraisers told the board some Dubia Road sales were older, lower-quality mobile-home sales; newer sales in neighboring developments supported higher prices-per-square-foot. Assessors also noted that one unsolicited lowball offer Evans received came from a national “we-buy-land” service that typically offers well below market and is not a reliable indicator of fair market value.

Board members debated whether neighborhood factors such as salvage yards, trespass, and access could justify a location-based downward adjustment. The board ultimately voted to modify the assessor’s 2025 determination: by recorded motion the board granted Evans a reduced total assessment of $290,000 (land $37,500; improvements $252,500). The clerk will prepare findings of fact and conclusions of law for the board’s April 18 meeting and mail the outcome to the parties.

Ending The board instructed the clerk to prepare written findings; assessors will implement the revised assessment after findings are finalized.