Fulton County assessor warns homeowners of state-driven valuation increases, appeal deadline June 16

Assessor Casey told the Fulton County Council on May 20 that changes made by the Indiana Department of Local Government Finance (DLGF) have raised the state cost tables used to calculate assessed values and changed the county location multiplier, producing apparent increases in property valuations.

The assessor said the DLGF implemented roughly a 30% increase in cost-per-square-foot values applied to residential structures and adjusted many accessory items (detached garages, pools, decks and the footprint of central air). She said the county’s location cost multiplier moved from 0.87 to 0.92. "What this all boils down to is that cost per square foot is roughly what the construction material should cost to rebuild whatever it's applied to," the assessor said. "It's state mandated. There's nothing we can do about it."

The assessor presented side-by-side comparisons showing how the state’s changes, not local appraisals, produced the shifts. She said county assessors review and rely on property cards (square footage, finish level and listed attributes such as extra bathrooms, central air and fireplaces) and encouraged residents to bring photos or documentation when the assessor’s office has incorrect interior or finish information: "If there's no finish in your basement but we have it, my God, come see us, bring us pictures. We want to know it's not there. We'll take it out." Residents who believe the assessor’s record is wrong have until June 16 to file appeals, she said.

The assessor also said DLGF re-certified farmland values on May 9, lowering the base agricultural rate from $2,390 to $2,120; that change affects properties with agricultural acreage and certain excess land categories. She said because the new ag rate is lower than the rate used on recent mailings, the DLGF does not require the office to re-mail those notices. The assessor warned that accessory farm buildings — granaries, milk houses, poultry houses, pole barns used for farming — will also see cost-table-driven changes in coming valuation cycles, but she said the size of those changes varied in examples she’d seen.

On staffing and operations, the assessor said the county’s contract assessor (Ad Valorem) will finish reassessment work in May 2026 and that the county will transition reassessment duties in-house afterward. She outlined plans to convert a part-time employee to full-time and retrain existing staff to keep reassessments local. "We're absolutely still going to do reassessment in house. Our last time that we'll have Ad Valorem doing reassessment will be May of 2026," she said.

Why it matters: the DLGF cost-table and multiplier changes are statewide administrative decisions that alter assessed values but are not local policy choices. The assessor stressed that residents can only appeal factual errors in their property records to lower assessments and cannot appeal the state’s cost-table changes themselves.

The county auditor and council members asked procedural questions during the update; no formal action on valuations was taken by the council at the meeting. Residents with questions were encouraged to contact the assessor’s office and to bring documentation to correct factual errors on property cards before the June 16 appeal deadline.

Ending: The assessor said her office will continue outreach and provide side-by-side comparisons for affected taxpayers. She asked anyone with questions to reach out to the office directly for help documenting and correcting property records.