Court Opinion

ID: 9755414
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 20:37:36.449676+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:28:07.204913
License: Public Domain

DISSENTING OPINION BY
Judge SMITH-RIBNER.
I respectfully dissent because I would reverse the order of the Court of Common Pleas of Cumberland County to the extent that it failed to adjust the fair market value of Appellants’ residence by taking into account their appraiser’s (Mr. Roth-man’s) $100,000 valuation of the finished basement in the property. The trial court accepted Mr. Rothman’s opinion that 4402 square feet of the basement is finished and adjusted Mr. Rothman’s valuation of the *1089residence from $2,000,000 to $2,396,180 based on the trial court’s applying a $90 per square foot assessment to the basement’s 4402 square footage. Appellee’s expert (Ms. Stouffer) placed a lower valuation on the basement’s square footage at $75 per square foot, which the trial court rejected. I am convinced that the trial court erred when it established a fair market value for the basement of $396,180 and then added this amount to Mr. Rothman’s $2,000,000 valuation when he in fact already had included $100,000 for the basement area in his appraisal.
Appellant argues that under the Uniform Residential Appraisal Report Guidelines, a single-family home in Central Pennsylvania without the quality of Appellants’ basement would not require adjustment. Notwithstanding this point, Appellant’s complaint is that the trial court committed an error of law and/or abuse of its discretion when it effectively imposed a double valuation for Appellants’ basement area, and I agree. Had the trial court properly accounted for the fact that Mr. Rothman’s $2,000,000 valuation included $100,000 for the basement area it would have correctly set a $2,296,180 fair market value for the property instead of $2,396,-180.
This Court must determine in its review of this tax assessment appeal whether the trial court abused its discretion, committed an error of law or made a decision that is unsupported by the evidence. Expressway 95 Bus. Ctr., LP v. Bucks County Board of Assessment, 921 A.2d 70 (Pa.Cmwlth.2007). After receiving the evidence, the trial court makes an independent determination of the fair market value of the subject property on the basis of the competent, credible and relevant evidence presented in the case. Id. In the case sub judice, the trial court made a decision that is not supported by the evidence when it, first, arrived at an amount per square footage for the basement which neither expert presented, and, second, when it arrived at a valuation for the basement area that reflects a figure determined by the trial court based on its own and includes an amount already incorporated into Mr. Rothman’s appraisal. This double counting, or double valuation, for the basement square footage constitutes an abuse of the trial court’s discretion, and it is neither supported by the evidence nor by the law. I therefore dissent on this issue.