Most people dread audits. Jump for joy when the assessor audits your personal property!  Why? Because when the assessor investigates up to four years of personal property purchases and retirements and classifications, then it allows you to adjust the values for all of the years that the assessor audits. This is a significant opportunity to get retroactive reductions for several years when normally the appeal is only for the year that the appeal is filed. Appeals for these audits must occur within 60 days of the audit adjustment letter that is sent by the assessor. This deadline is critical.

I argue lower values to get assessment reductions in several ways: 1) comparable sales of similar property, 2) reduced life expectancy based on timing of actual replacement of property, and 3) shorter life expectancy based on board of equalization studies.