LACKAWANNA CO. (WOLF) \u2014 For the first time in 58 years, Lackawanna County property owners are seeing the results of a countywide reassessment reflected in their tax bills, and for some, the changes are dramatic. While county officials say the move was long overdue and necessary for fairness, some homeowners say the increases are hard to swallow. <\/p>\n
For many residents, the new Lackawanna County reassessment is something they\u2019ve never experienced in their lifetime. Now, after nearly six decades without an update, new reassessment numbers are landing in mailboxes, and they\u2019re sparking strong reactions.<\/p>\n
Jennifer Smith of Spring Brook Township says her county tax bill alone doubled.<\/p>\n
\u201cI got my tax bill from Lackawanna County that shows my taxes are doubled last year. This is just property tax. That\u2019s not my school tax and my library tax and my local tax that I have to pay. This is just one of the three that I get.\u201d<\/p>\n
Smith lives in a 900-square-foot home built in 1945. She says her assessed value jumped from $120,000 to $222,300.<\/p>\n
“There’s no garage, there’s no additions, there’s no nothing. So how is this justified? I don’t see it,” Smith said.<\/p>\n
She says the increase is especially difficult at a time when other costs are already rising.<\/p>\n
“I don’t know what other people are going to do, especially the elderly. With the prices of heat and electric, I don’t know how they’re going to survive it,” said Smith.<\/p>\n
County Assessment Director Pat Tobin says the reassessment was unavoidable. The county had not updated property values in 58 years and was under court order to complete the process by January 1, 2026.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe reason people saw drastic increases is a combination of 58 years since the last reassessment and also their previous assessment was very, very grossly under assessed and now it\u2019s in line with the market,\u201d Tobin said.<\/p>\n
Tobin says the county\u2019s working model anticipated about one-third of residents would see their taxes remain about the same, one-third would see increases, and one-third would see decreases. However, he says final analysis is still underway.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve heard from just about everyone who saw their taxes increase. Unfortunately, we don\u2019t hear from the people who didn\u2019t see an increase or whose taxes went down. That\u2019s part of the business.\u201d<\/p>\n
Realtor Pat Rogan, owner of The Hub Real Estate Group in Dunmore, says his office has been overwhelmed since the bills were mailed.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve been inundated with calls since the tax bills came out. As you can see at my desk, I have about 20 of them in front of me right now from clients that asked me to do reviews and a lot of people are upset,” said Rogan.<\/p>\n
Rogan says most of the people reaching out to him saw increases.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe majority of people that are calling me, their taxes went up. If they didn\u2019t go up, they wouldn\u2019t be calling. Obviously, I\u2019m talking to people that are mostly upset.\u201d<\/p>\n
Still, he says there were some decreases.<\/p>\n
\u201cI did have one or two that I have listed currently that their taxes went down. We\u2019re adjusting those listings because obviously if the taxes are less, that makes the property more desirable.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rogan says the reassessment was necessary, but he\u2019s noticed inconsistencies.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe reassessment needed to be done. It was long overdue. However, the way it was done, there\u2019s a lot of discrepancies on some of these properties where I\u2019ve talked to people that have neighbors on the same block with similar properties, and there\u2019s still ones here and one there. So, there\u2019s still a way to go toward getting this straightened out.\u201d<\/p>\n
He says the changes are already impacting the housing market.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s people that may have been thinking about selling and were 50\/50 on it and then they got a 30% increase and said, \u2018That\u2019s it, I\u2019m selling.\u2019 On the other hand, there might be people that were thinking about maybe selling and if theirs went down a little bit, they\u2019re probably going to stay put. It definitely affects individually people in the market.\u201d<\/p>\n
He also warns buyers to be cautious.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnyone that\u2019s buying now, I would definitely advise them not only to look at what current taxes are because the MLS is going to show last year\u2019s until it gets updated. Whoever they\u2019re working with should be advising them, these are what the new taxes are now that the bills are out, because that\u2019s going to make a big difference in their monthly payments.\u201d<\/p>\n
The reassessment was completed by Tyler Technologies after nearly four years of work, covering tens of thousands of properties. One year prior to the reassessment, countywide property taxes increased 33 percent for everyone.<\/p>\n
Despite the backlash, Tobin says the goal is long-term fairness.<\/p>\n
Residents with questions can contact the assessment office now or file an appeal beginning April 1 for their 2027 taxes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LACKAWANNA CO. (WOLF) \u2014 For the first time in 58 years, Lackawanna County property owners are seeing the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":119479,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[178,180,179],"class_list":{"0":"post-119478","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-scranton","8":"tag-scranton","9":"tag-scranton-headlines","10":"tag-scranton-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119478","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=119478"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119478\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/119479"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=119478"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=119478"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=119478"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}