Better Treatment of Expensed Equipment
Many counties have been incorrectly assessing expensed equipment. The State of California mandates the counties audit property taxpayers every 4 years. The counties have been using this audit to pick up expensed equipment that is not normally reported on your 571-L’s. While it is appropriate to assess this property, there are valid arguments, which we use to mitigate the amount assessed. We have won cases where the board ruled in our favor for allowing trending on a 5-year life for items greater than $1,000 of cost. Items of $1,000 or less are not trended at all and are assessed like supplies wherein only 1/12 of the cost for the entire year is assessed. The winning arguments do not allow “stacking” of expensed costs for more than one year.