Petitioner cites qualified sale, financials in challenge to Hernando County assessment of Brooksville assisted-living property

Colleen Millett, special magistrate, convened petition number 25-245 Friday in Hernando County, where representatives for the property formerly known as Noble Senior Living Center (branded Elevated Estates of Brooksville) disputed the property appraiser's 2025 assessment.

Daniel Scott and Kimberly Hubert of the Hernando County Property Appraiser's Office confirmed the office's 2025 just, assessed and taxable value for the property at 307 Howell Avenue as stated in their packet. "For 2025, the just assessed and taxable value are all the same at 3,073,860," a property appraiser representative said during the hearing.

Petitioner representative Rob Udall said his client submitted the deed and closing statement showing a qualified sale in October 2023 and provided a rent roll and annual profit-and-loss statements for calendar year 2024. Udall said his income-capitalization analysis produced a lower indicated value; he asked the magistrate to "take into consideration the qualified transaction" and the financials now in evidence. Udall walked the record through broker commissions on the closing statement and described an income-based valuation that incorporated a stabilized vacancy, a pro forma net operating income and cap-rate adjustments. His packet included a rent roll showing present occupancy and an expense schedule; his working income approach produced an indicated just value (after adjustments and a cost-of-sale reduction) materially below the property appraiser's assessment.

Property appraiser staff replied that the office had not received an income statement prior to the statutory TRIM (tax notice) deadline and cited case law about the timeliness of income evidence. Daniel Scott referenced Higgs v. Goode (2002) and explained the office did not have timely access to taxpayer income data when it set assessments prior to TRIM; Scott nonetheless accepted the documents at the hearing and the magistrate admitted the appraiser's rebuttal evidentiary packet as PAO B and the petitioner's packet as PET 1.

The magistrate heard brief rebuttal arguments on both sides about the reliability and weight of the income approach versus the appraiser's cost-and-sales analyses. Udall argued the sale was an arm's-length, marketed transaction and that the packet should be weighed accordingly; the property appraiser's office said it relied on its cost and sales approaches when income data were not available prior to TRIM.

Magistrate Millett admitted the evidence and said she would review the materials and file a recommended decision with the Value Adjustment Board within weeks. No formal administrative change was made at the hearing.