Fulton County Reassessing Its Assessment Process For Trophy Properties

The Fulton County Board of Commissioners has launched an initiative to ensure values of commercial properties like data centers and high-end office buildings are being assessed accurately.

Board Chairman Robb Pitts announced last week he is seeking an independent audit of the county’s assessment process for trophy properties. The county put out a request for proposals for firms to vie for the chance to check the county’s numbers, with responses due Thursday, according to a Rough Draft Atlanta report.

The chairman also wants to tap outside counsel with deep experience in real estate valuations to help the county defend its numbers during property tax appeals.

The Georgia Senate voted overwhelmingly last week to tighten the rules capping the rate at which counties can tax homeowners. If it passes the Georgia House of Representatives, that bill would close a loophole in a previous piece of legislation tying property tax increases to the rate of inflation. The loophole allowed school districts and counties to go above that rate.

The county’s assessment process for commercial properties has long been criticized by civic activists who say those properties often sell for much more than their assessed value. Under Georgia state law, counties must attempt to assess properties within 10% of their fair market value, Rough Draft Atlanta reported.

The county has long insisted its assessments faithfully adhere to the formulas created by the state. Fulton Chief Appraiser Roderick Conley told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution in January the county’s commercial assessments “align with standard mass appraisal established by the state and were found to be in compliance based on the state’s 2024 sales ratio study.”

However, a 2023 Georgia Tech School of Public Policy study found that the city of Atlanta, Atlanta Public Schools and Fulton County could be missing out on a combined $290M in commercial property tax each year, according to an Atlantic Civic Circle report. 

For the study, researchers looked at property tax records in Fulton and DeKalb counties as well as appraised values by the Fulton Board of Assessors. They compared the numbers with commercial property sales records, ultimately finding that the properties were being appraised at 61% of their actual market value on average. 

Julian Bene, a civic activist and a persistent critic of Fulton County’s assessing math, praised the recent efforts of Pitts and Fulton County Board of Assessors Chair Lee Morris to reassess the county’s commercial property values. Bene expressed hope that this could yield increased tax revenue from data centers in particular. 

“Thanks to Chairman Pitts’ & Board of Assessors Chair Lee Morris’ leadership, improved data-center valuation is underway, potentially worth $100M extra in 2026,” Bene said in a statement.