Assessed Value $3,200,000
Will sell for $2,000,000 (or less) HOME COMPLETELY DESTROYED BY FIRE! MORRISSEY'S UNREASONABLE POLICY OF OVER VALUING "MANSION CLASS" PROPERTIES A DETERMINING FACTOR IN WHY THIS HISTORICAL LANDMARK WAS NOT REBUILT! MORRISSEY HAS VALUED THIS UNINHABITABLE PROPERTY AT OVER $3,200,000 FOR THE YEAR 2009, AGAIN DISPLAYING HIS COMPLETE LACK OF FAIRNESS!
Morrissey's claim to fame - wasting more than $250,000 of taxpayer's money pursuing his vengeful opinion of value on this one property!
In 2001 (effective 1/1/2002), Morrissey and his deputy, Berry Couch,
pictured here,
conceived a plan to extort additional tax revenue from home owners of
large homes of over 8,000 square feet. In doing so, Morrissey and his
comrade made up a new sub-class of residential properties known as the
"mansion class". Morrissey, at substantial cost to the taxpayers,
employed one of his cronies in the appraisal business to "rank" these
homes. A chart of the original homes embracing the mansion class is
included in this web site. In valuing these properties, they applied a
laughable statistical formula multiplying the cost of each of these
residences by 1.95 to arrive at their assessed value (see Nebraska Court
of Appeals decision below).
Thomas and Nora Hilt, owners of The HomeMakers and the owners of the property located at 9909 Fieldcrest (formerly known as the Witherspoon Mansion), appealed their 2002 valuation by Morrissey of $3,345,900. After reviewing the protest, Morrissey agreed to a realistic valuation of $1,400,000.
Although Morrissey initially agreed to a valuation of $1,500,000 with the HomeMakers (Hilt) for 2003, he double crossed them (Morrissey does not act in good faith and his word is worthless) and valued their property at $2,928,000. Upon appealing to the Nebraska Court of Appeals, the Court concluded Morrissey's formula for determining valuations of properties in the mansion class to be "mysterious .. arbitrary .. unfair and unreasonable." and valued the property at $1,500,000.
For the tax year 2004, the County Board of Equalization lowered Morrissey's opinion of value of $2,561,700 for the property to $1,615,000. Morrissey appealed this decision to the state Tax Equalization Review Commission whereupon they ruled in favor of the Hilts stating that Morrissey had not proven his opinion of value. Morrissey did NOT appeal this decision!
For the past 4 years, Morrissey has valued the Hilt property at more than $3,000,000, despite the fact it has been continually listed for sale at less than $2,000,000. In each instance, the County Board of Equalization has reduced the value to $1,615,000. Out of more than thirty thousand protests, the only one Morrissey has appealed is, you guessed it, the Hilt property. Morrissey has spent more than $250,000 of taxpayer funds pursuing his useless opinion of value for this property! When questioned by one of the respected County Commissioner as to how much of the taxpayer's money he had spent, Morrissey's reply was "I don't know". Morrissey is an incompetent leader and a liar! How can Morrissey be in charge of his office and not have any knowledge of how much taxpayer money (deep pockets) he has squandered pursuing his vengeful and unproven valuation of this single property? This same County Commissioner stated to Morrissey, "my advice to you is to give it up!" The Hilt's, as a matter of right, are entitled to the quiet enjoyment of their property without continual interference from a detestable and rancorous county servant!
During the past several years, five of the so-called "mansion class" properties have been listed for sale. These properties have sold for amounts substantially below their assessed values. Recently, the number one ranked property in the mansion class, as determined by Morrissey and his collaborators, sold for less than 53% of its assessed value. This particular property has subsequently been demolished. Undoubtedly, Morrissey's over-assessment of this property was a primary factor in the decision to raze this property. It was 12 years newer, 50% larger, located on a superior site, and had significantly more amenities than the Hilt property. It does not take a rocket scientist, or even a qualified appraiser, to figure out the Hilt property's comparable fair market value is far less than $3,200,000 as valued by Morrissey.