Tens of thousands of Louisville homeowners will soon be getting new property value assessments and most of those them will be lower.Jefferson County Property Valuation Administrator Tony Lindauer says assessments are down about five percent in the southwestern end of the county, and ten percent in much of west Louisville, the Shively area, and eastern communities. The hardest hit area is Louisville’s Russell neighborhood, where values have dropped as much as 15-percent.Lindauer says nevertheless, Louisville has endured the burst of the housing bubble relatively well."We are very, very well off. With Dayton, Memphis, Nashville, St. Louis, all of our surrounding areas, Indianpolis, they are all down much farther than we are. We are just basically flat," he said.Lindauer says more than 60,000 residential properties will have lower appraisals this year.That’s not good news to government entities that collect property taxes based on home values. Mayor Greg Fischer's office says the administration does not support a property tax increase to offset the losses.Lindauer says there’s evidence of market optimism: newly constructed homes that went unsold last year are being absorbed, and new building permits are picking up. He says the commercial market is also showing new signs of life."I think that the one thing we need to see is the banks turning lose of some money. They were giving it away and that got us into the problem, and now they need to turn loose of it to help get out of this," Lindauder said.Lindauer's "2011 State of the Real Estate" report was released today.
Rick Howlett was midday host and the host of LPM's weekly talk show, "In Conversation." He was with LPM from 2001-2023 and held many different titles, including Morning Edition host, Assignment Editor and Interim News Director. He died in August 2023. Read a remembrance of Rick here.