Officials with the Iowa Department of Revenue report that on Wednesday, October 26th, the Department issued an Assessment Limitations Order, or “rollback,” on property values in Iowa. The Order adjusts the property values used by local governments to compute property taxes for agricultural, residential, commercial, and industrial property.   State law allows no more than a four percent (4%) increase in taxable values for these property classes from year to year in order to cushion the impact of inflation. The Order sets forth the following taxable values:

• The taxable value for residential property is 50.7518% of the assessed value. This is an increase from the 2010 level of 48.5299 %.  (Residential assessed value in Iowa is $135.8 billion; the taxable value is $68.9 billion, which is 50.7518% of the assessed value.)  Residential property includes farm dwellings.
• The taxable value for agricultural property is 57.5411% of the assessed value.  This is a decrease from the 2010 level of 69.0152%.  Agricultural property is assessed at its productivity value. (The 2011 assessed value is $47.6 billion; the taxable value is $27.4 billion, which is 57.5411% of the assessed value.)
• No adjustments were ordered for the commercial, industrial, railroad, and utility classes, because their assessed values did not increase enough to qualify for reductions. Utility property is limited to an 8% annual growth. Railroad property is adjusted by the lowest percentage applied to commercial, industrial, and utility property.

County auditors will apply the adjustments to each property class to compute the taxable values used for property taxes. Tax liabilities based on the 2011 taxable values and payable in fiscal year 2012-13 will not be determined until local taxing bodies establish their property tax needs early next year.

Additional information about the rollback can be found at: http://www.state.ia.us/tax/locgov/propequalroll.html