By Miles and Nicole Layton

EDENTON — Chowan County Manager Kevin Howard is pushing back against what he calls a common misconception about the county’s recent property revaluation — that rising assessed values automatically mean higher tax bills.
“When we do present the budget, we do this actually every year, not just on a revaluation year, is (we want) to bring in the same amount of money as we would see the year before,” Howard told the Albemarle Observer in a recent interview. “What would that tax rate be?”
The answer, Howard explained, lies in the concept of revenue neutrality — a calculation that determines the tax rate that would generate the same total property tax revenue as the prior fiscal year, regardless of how property values have changed.
Howard will present the county budget at the Board of Commissioners meeting on May 4, and the revenue-neutral rate will be front and center.

“It’ll give an amount for what that is,” he said. “What that number will tell us — it’ll tell everyone — is to bring in the same amount of revenue, property tax-wise, as we brought in for Fiscal Year 25-26. The tax rate needs to be X, and the current tax rate is Y, and then shows the difference in those two.”
In plain terms: because property values have risen sharply — by an estimated 38 percent to 42 percent countywide — the tax rate itself must come down to avoid a windfall for county coffers.

“Instead of having to raise your tax rate, we’re going to reduce our tax rate,” Howard said. “How far can we go and make our budget work?”

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Why did my revaluation go up so much?

Much of the public anxiety over the revaluation stems from seeing assessed values jump by tens of thousands of dollars on properties that, to their owners, haven’t changed. Howard pointed to market forces, particularly in the modest end of the housing market, as the driver.
“The more reasonably priced houses — $200,000, $300,000 — that’s the largest part of the market,” he said. “So we saw much more growth in that. You had more people looking for houses like that.”
Edenton’s reputation as a desirable small-town destination has further inflated values. Somewhat counterintuitively, Howard and Chowan County Tax Administrator Chris Hill have noted that higher-end properties did not always see the same percentage gains as more modest homes, where demand has been especially strong.
Even so, Howard cautioned that revenue neutrality does not mean every taxpayer’s bill stays exactly the same.

“Some people could still see a tax collection increase because their property went up more than what the average was,” he said. “Or it went up less than the average — they may see a decrease in what their property tax is.”

An eight-year backlog

Howard traced the size of this revaluation’s increases partly to the county’s previous assessment cycle. When he joined Chowan County in 2014, the most recent revaluation had actually shown declining values in the aftermath of the 2008 real estate collapse. The county then went eight years before revaluing again — and in the interim, the post-COVID housing market surged.
“You had the fact it went down, and then after COVID, the market here took off,” Howard said. “It was an eight-year cycle that just saw tremendous increases.”
In response, the county shifted to a four-year revaluation cycle, reasoning that more frequent updates would smooth out large swings.

“Each increase, if it continues to go up, the increase won’t be quite as much as it was if we waited eight years,” Howard said. The strategy was sound in theory — but the market kept climbing anyway.

“In four years, we had almost as much of (a revaluation) increase as we had over that eight-year period,” he said.

Relief options for residents

Howard was emphatic that residents who believe their assessment is inaccurate or who may qualify for tax relief should act quickly.
Homestead and veterans’ exemptions are available for qualifying residents based on income and other criteria.

“I would encourage anybody who thinks they may qualify to come to the tax office — they can apply for that,” Howard said.
For those contesting their assessed value, a formal appeals process is currently open through the Board of Equalization and Review. Howard said the application deadline is 5 p.m. May 11.

“Getting the application in is the key prior to that deadline,” he stressed.
He did offer one caution for those pursuing an appeal: Assessors conducting the revaluation work from exterior observation only and do not enter homes. Errors can run in either direction.

“Most likely it would go down, but there is a chance it could go up based on what re-looking at the property,” Howard said. “I don’t want somebody to come in thinking it’s going to go down and then find out there was an error made and we didn’t count your third bedroom.”
His broader message to Chowan County residents: don’t panic.
“The board’s going to take what our needs are and look at that,” Howard said. “They’ll decide how close can we get to revenue neutral and make things work. It’s the same process every year.”

— Albemarle Observer