Case Title: Soin v. Greene Cty. Bd. of Revision

Citation: 2006-Ohio-4708

Docket Number: 20052070

State: ohio

Court: Ohio Supreme Court

Date: 2006-09-27T00:00:00Z

Document:
[Cite as Soin v. Greene Cty. Bd. of Revision, 110 Ohio St.3d 408, 2006-Ohio-4708.] 
 
 
SOIN ET AL., APPELLANTS, v. GREENE COUNTY BOARD OF REVISION ET AL., 
APPELLEES. 
[Cite as Soin v. Greene Cty. Bd. of Revision,  
110 Ohio St.3d 408, 2006-Ohio-4708.] 
Taxation — Real property — Valuation — Taxpayers’ challenge to county’s 
valuation of luxury custom-designed home in modest area is rejected — 
Taxpayers’ burden of demonstrating entitlement to proffered value is not 
met when expert fails to obtain actual cost data or provide meaningful 
comparables. 
(No. 2005-2070 — Submitted August 8, 2006 — Decided September 27, 2006.) 
APPEAL from the Board of Tax Appeals, No. 2004-V-490. 
__________________ 
 
Per Curiam. 
{¶1} 
The appellants, Rajesh K. Soin and Indu Soin, challenge the value 
assigned to their real property by the Greene County Auditor for tax year 2003.  
The property – identified in the county auditor’s records as parcel number B42-
0004-0016-0-0002-00 – covers 89.409 acres of land in the city of Beavercreek.  A 
six-bedroom residence containing more than 25,800 square feet of living space is 
located on the property.  Construction of the home began in 2002, and it was 
completed in 2004. 
{¶2} 
The Greene County Auditor fixed the true value of the property at 
$3,645,840 for tax year 2003, concluding that the land itself was worth $272,180 
and the improvements to the property were worth $3,373,660.  The property 
owners asked the Greene County Board of Revision to reduce that valuation, 
arguing that the property was worth only $1,428,000 on January 1, 2003. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
2 
{¶3} 
The Board of Revision determined that the county auditor had 
undervalued the land itself but had overvalued the improvements.  According to 
the Board of Revision, the total true value of the property on January 1, 2003, was 
$3,736,800, which included $1,598,320 for the land and $2,138,480 for the 
improvements.  The Soins then filed an appeal under R.C. 5717.01 with the Board 
of Tax Appeals (“BTA”), in which they again asked that the property’s value be 
set at $1,428,000.  The BTA held a hearing and then affirmed the decision of the 
Board of Revision. 
{¶4} 
The property owners have now appealed to this court.  For the 
reasons that follow, we affirm the BTA’s decision. 
{¶5} 
“When cases are appealed from a board of revision to the BTA, the 
burden of proof is on the appellant, whether it be a taxpayer or a board of 
education, to prove its right to an increase [in] or decrease from the value 
determined by the board of revision.”  Columbus City School Dist. Bd. of Edn. v. 
Franklin Cty. Bd. of Revision (2001), 90 Ohio St.3d 564, 566, 740 N.E.2d 276.  
And when the BTA is considering testimony and appraisal reports about the value 
of property, “the BTA possesses wide discretion in evaluating the weight of the 
evidence and the credibility of the witnesses that come before it.”  Fawn Lake 
Apts. v. Cuyahoga Cty. Bd. of Revision (1999), 85 Ohio St.3d 609, 613, 710 
N.E.2d 681. 
{¶6} 
At the hearing before the BTA, a state-certified real-estate 
appraiser testified on behalf of the property owners.  That appraiser – Stephen 
Weis – calculated a value for the property under two different methods: (1) the 
sales-comparison approach, which focuses on the prices of comparable properties 
that have changed hands recently, and (2) the cost approach, which focuses on the 
cost of replacing the improvements on the property.  Weis relied on both 
valuation methods to reach his final conclusion, and he appraised the entire 
property’s value at $272,180, which was the value of the land alone, according to 
January Term, 2006 
3 
the county auditor.  Weis explained that had the Soins’ home been finished on 
January 1, 2003, the property would have been worth $2,470,000.  But because 
the home and other improvements were unfinished on that date, and – as Weis 
explained in his written appraisal report – “the cost to finish the project at that 
stage [was] greater than the overall value when complete,” he concluded that the 
market value of the improvements on the property was $0 on the tax lien date, and 
he simply accepted the county auditor’s $272,180 appraisal of the land itself. 
{¶7} 
The BTA found Weis’s opinion unconvincing.  The properties that 
Weis examined in connection with his sales-comparison analysis did not provide 
“any meaningful basis of comparison” to the property at issue in Greene County, 
according to the BTA.  The BTA also found that Weis, when developing his cost 
analysis, “inexplicably failed to obtain the actual cost data” from the construction 
of the Soins’ home on the property in question.  And according to the BTA, 
Weis’s opinion that the improvements on the property had zero value and that the 
total valuation of the land and improvements amounted to $272,180 on January 1, 
2003, was “unsupportable.” 
{¶8} 
Weis testified at the BTA hearing that he did not do an appraisal of 
the land itself, but instead assumed that the land value determined by the county 
auditor – $272,180 – was correct.  Weis’s written appraisal and his testimony 
before the BTA focused solely on the value of the home and other improvements 
on the property. 
{¶9} 
In their appeal to this court, however, the property owners focus 
not on the value of the improvements but rather on the value of the land itself.  
They contend that the board of revision and the BTA improperly set the value of 
the land at $1,598,320 rather than adhering to the much lower amount determined 
by the county auditor. 
{¶10} In affirming the board of revision’s higher value for the land itself, 
the BTA cited a “comparable sale of vacant land.”  A certified copy of a 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
4 
conveyance fee form from that sale was made a part of the record at the BTA 
hearing, and the property owners’ appraiser acknowledged that the 37.494-acre 
parcel described on that form – which sold for $662,500 (or $17,669 per acre) in 
April 2004 – was adjacent to the property in question.  The BTA concluded that 
the board of revision’s decision to set the value of the land at issue in this case at 
$1,598,320 – which equated to a $60,000 value for the one-acre home site and 
$17,400 per acre for the remaining 88.409 acres of land – was “well supported” 
by the evidence, and the BTA likewise adopted that value for the land. 
{¶11} We find no grounds to overturn the BTA’s decision.  Certainly, the 
BTA was entitled to reject the testimony that the property owners’ appraiser 
offered concerning the value of the improvements, for as we have said, the BTA 
“is not required to adopt the appraisal methodology espoused by any expert or 
witness.”  Hotel Statler v. Cuyahoga Cty. Bd. of Revision (1997), 79 Ohio St.3d 
299, 303, 681 N.E.2d 425.  In any event, the property owners have not challenged 
in this appeal the value set by the BTA for the improvements on the property. 
{¶12} As for the value of the land itself that the property owners do 
challenge here, we have explained that the BTA’s decision in a valuation case 
such as this will be reversed by this court “only when it affirmatively appears 
from the record that such decision is unreasonable or unlawful.”  Throckmorton v. 
Hamilton Cty. Bd. of Revision (1996), 75 Ohio St.3d 227, 229, 661 N.E.2d 1095.  
In light of the evidence presented by the county defendants at the BTA hearing 
concerning an arm’s-length sale of adjacent land, and in light of the property 
owners’ failure to present an appraisal of their own land (as opposed to an 
appraisal of the improvements on that land), we cannot say that the BTA acted 
unreasonably when it adopted the board of revision’s valuation for the land itself. 
{¶13} The property owners urge us to reweigh the evidence and to return 
the land value to the amount originally set by the county auditor.  Yet this court 
“does not sit either as a super BTA or as a trier of fact de novo.”  DAK, PLL v. 
January Term, 2006 
5 
Franklin Cty. Bd. of Revision, 105 Ohio St.3d 84, 2005-Ohio-573, 822 N.E.2d 
790, ¶ 16.  “The fair market value of property for tax purposes is a question of 
fact, the determination of which is primarily within the province of the taxing 
authorities.”  Id. at ¶ 14. 
{¶14} Both the board of revision and the BTA have examined the 
evidence, and both have agreed on the proper value of the land and the 
improvements in question.  “The BTA has wide discretion to determine the 
weight given to evidence and the credibility of witnesses before it.”  Meijer, Inc. 
v. Montgomery Cty. Bd. of Revision (1996), 75 Ohio St.3d 181, 185, 661 N.E.2d 
1056.  “[I]t is not the function of this court to substitute its judgment on factual 
issues for that of the Board of Tax Appeals.”  Citizens Financial Corp. v. 
Porterfield (1971), 25 Ohio St.2d 53, 57, 54 O.O.2d 191, 266 N.E.2d 828. 
{¶15} The BTA’s decision to accept the board of revision’s valuation is 
reasonable and is supported by evidence presented at the BTA hearing, and we 
find that the BTA did not abuse its discretion in reaching that conclusion.  The 
decision of the BTA is therefore affirmed. 
Decision affirmed. 
 
MOYER, C.J., RESNICK, PFEIFER, LUNDBERG STRATTON, O’CONNOR, 
O’DONNELL and LANZINGER, JJ., concur. 
__________________ 
 
Coolidge, Wall, Womsley & Lombard Co., L.P.A., and Jonas J. 
Gruenberg, for appellants. 
 
Rich, Crites & Dittmer and James R. Gorry, for appellees Greene County 
Board of Revision and Greene County Auditor. 
______________________