IN FOCUS: Assessments, housing supply, and shrinking populations, Part 2 |
(Ed. note: This is Part 2 of a two-part column examining property reassessments and housing realities in many Upstate New York communities. The first part, which ran last week, explained how reassessments function, while this installment looks at why assessments rise, how homeowners can challenge them, and what broader housing trends are driving the conversation.)
PART 2: Why rising assessments should not be surprising
One of the arguments floating around online is that housing prices are falling, which supposedly makes reassessment increases suspect.
That claim doesn’t match what the housing data actually shows.
In Macedon, the median listing price in February sat around $368,650, with the average listing price exceeding $382,000. Median prices are still up roughly 6% compared to a year ago, while average prices have risen more than 10%. That’s not a collapsing market — it’s a market that has continued climbing.
And that’s not even drawing comparison to what prices looked like 5-10 years ago.
Inventory also remains extremely tight. In February there were only five active listings on the market, while 12 homes were already pending sale. That means there were roughly 2.7 pending homes for every active listing available.
In simple terms: Demand significantly outweighs supply.
Homes are taking longer to sell than they did a year ago — about 61 days on average compared to roughly 40 previously — but that reflects a market cooling slightly from pandemic-era speed, not one collapsing in value. Even with that slowdown, the number of available homes........