Home values likely to drop again

MONTGOMERY COUNTY, Ohio (WDTN) - Montgomery County's auditor says property values may take another big drop in the next revaluation.

Auditor Karl Keith tells 2 NEWS values may go down another five to seven percent when the process is finished in 2014. That's on top of the seven percent drop experienced in the 2011 Triennial Update. That drop cost the county $2 billion.

"We're in for a long struggle here," Keith says.

Keith tells 2 NEWS some of the biggest drags on property values are the more than 7,000 abandoned homes across the county.

"When there's an abandoned property in the neighborhood it's going to drive the value of your property down," Keith says.

That's why the work going on in the Roosevelt neighborhood in Dayton is like a foundation of what will need to be done in many other places throughout the county.

Most people might be annoyed by the constant pounding going on outside their house, but not Charles Howard.

To him it's like a symphony of progress and he loves to come out and listen to the music.

"Noisy but exciting," is how Howard describes it.

In his more than 40 years in the Roosevelt neighborhood, the construction is one sight Howard never thought he'd see.

More than 80 old homes are being torn down and replaced with more than 40 new ones.

"It's amazing how fast they do this," Howard says. "I hope to live long enough to see it totally finished," Howard says.

Building back the rest of the county's home values won't happen so quickly.

"Those are long term issues," Keith says. "They're not going to be resolved overnight but they're issues our community has to address."

The 2014 revaluation is already underway.

Right now workers are taking pictures of homes. Next summer appraisers will be around to start putting dollar figures on properties.