NORWAY — Selectmen voted unanimously Thursday evening to raise the tax rate 35 cents, to $17.55 per $1,000 of assessed property value for 2019-20.

Norway Tax Assessor Natalie Andrews said a home assessed at $200,000 would see a tax increase of $70.

Owners of mobile homes may see a more dramatic increase because those values haven’t changed since 1997.

Andrews said improvements in how mobile homes are constructed has resulted in a discrepancy between their retail value and their assessed value.

“People were buying a mobile home, a double-wide, for $100,000, and then we put it in our system and get a value of $40,000 to tax because (the value) hadn’t been updated in so long,” she said.

She said town officials are prepared for a rise in abatements, once the changes are made.

“There’s going to be a lot of people who have mobile homes who are going to see an increase in that valuation who may want to discuss an abatement, which would involve going out to their mobile home,” she said. “Sometimes, that would be warranted, depending on the depreciation of that home.”

 

 


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