Any Experience Changing Tax Class of Brownstone?

I was wondering if anyone has ever changed the tax class of their brownstone.  Would love to hear about anyone’s experience getting this done.  We bought a brownstone that had been carved up into 5 (tiny!) units and we are converting it back into a single family.  At this point we are in the midst of a major renovation and the building is no longer 5 seperate units. The taxes are significantly higher on a 5 family than a 1 family and I am trying to change the building’s tax class.  Of course, we are also changing the C of O but the final sign off won’t happen until we are finished with construction.  I’ve got forms to submit to the Tax Commission (tc106 and tc200) and the Department of Finance (request for review of tax class 2 & 4) but since I was bounced around between so many city agencies before even getting this far, I just wanted to see if anyone else had ever gone through this process and if there is anything else I might need to do. I have an expediter who will help us with our C of O, but was told changing the tax class was something I should be able to do myself.  Thanks!

onefineday

in Taxes 13 years and 4 months ago

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pearlstoh | 13 years and 4 months ago

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I’m in the exact same boat! My home is/was an SRO (Tax Class 2 & Bldg Class C5) with an inexplicable 11 units according to DOF (there were never more than 7). We are finishing a gut reno that has made the house 2 units, putting it into Tax Class 1, but no one seems able to tell me how to go about making the change. I get a different answer every time I speak to a Finance Specialist at 311, and going to the DOF office was no help either – I was handed a form telling me to look up documents on line (the request for class review) and when I insisted on speaking to someone, I was told it wouldn’t help but I could wait if I wanted to. The Info Desk was right, though the lady I spoke to was very nice, she seemed confused about my question and just kept telling me it would happen automatically once my new C of O was issued. HA!  To be safe I plan on filing all of the above documents you mentioned. In my case, I pay $20K a year in property taxes as Class 2 and there’s no way I will pay close to that under Class 1, even if they triple my current assessed property value.

housepoor | 13 years and 4 months ago

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My experience with changing tax classes is that the tax savings may not be what you had hoped. I went down a class, going from a 4 family to a 3 after a major renovation. The tax savings were minor. The increased value that comes from your renovation will not be subject to a phase in and may very well bump your taxes up close to what the rate relief obtianed going from 5 unit to 1 unit would push them down. The seminal article on this was in the NYT in 2005 http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/20/realestate/20cov.html?pagewanted=print&position= I hope for your sake that these are extreme examples and the NYC tax people are kinder and gentler these days, but I wouldn’t spend that money just yet.