BC Assessment released its property assessments for 2018 on Tuesday, and Prince George residents can expect to see an increase in the assessed value of their homes.
The average value of a single-family house in Prince George increased from $287,000 to $302,000, a 5.2 per cent increase. Assessments are based on the estimated value as of July 1, 2017, and are used by municipalities to calculate the amount of property taxes owed by each property owner.
"The majority of residential home owners within the (northern B.C.) region can expect a slight increase, compared to last year's assessment," BC Assessment deputy assessor David Keough said in a press release. "Most home owners in... northern B.C. will see changes in the minus five per cent to plus five per cent range."
Other than a brief dip at the end of 2014, the value of single-family homes in Prince George has been increasing steadily since the beginning of 2014, according to data released by BC Assessment. By the third quarter of 2017, average house prices were 9.6 per cent above the July 1, 2016 average.
The first three quarters of 2017 saw 1,026 single-family home sales -up from 942 over the same period in 2016 and 929 in the same period of 2015.
In the City of Prince George, BC Assessment calculated a 5.42 per cent value increase in residential properties, 2.49 per cent increase in light industrial properties and a 3.59 per cent increase in business and other properties between the 2017 and 2018 assessments.
The increases were slightly lower in the Prince George rural area, which includes nearby communities like Pineview, Buckhorn, Salmon Valley, Hixon, Stoner, Nukko Lake and Red Rock, but stretches to include the rural area around Mackenize and Valemount.
In the rural area residential properties saw a 3.25 per cent increase, light industrial was up 0.37 per cent and business and other properties were up 1.49 per cent.
In northern B.C. the biggest swings in residential property values were in Granisle, which saw a 44.9 per cent increase in the average value of single family homes (from $42,000 to $61,000) and Kitimat, which saw the average value of a single-family house fall 16.2 per cent from $278,000 to $233,000.
The total assessed value of the more than 247,000 properties in all of northern B.C. increased from $60.3 billion in 2017 to $61.8 billion this year -including an estimated $1.5 billion due to new construction, subdivisions of existing lots and value changes due to rezoning.
Province-wide, the more than 2.04 million properties in B.C. were assessed at $1.86 trillion, a 12 per cent increase over 2017. Non-market change, including new construction, subdivisions and rezoning, accounted for approximately $31.6 billion in additional value -up from $24.7 billion in 2017.
While northern B.C. accounts for approximately 70 per cent of the province's landmass, it accounts for only 3.3 per cent of total assessed value of property.
BC Assessment's website provides a map of the top 500 most valuable residential properties in the province.
The single most expensive home in the province is on Point Grey Road in Vancouver. The seven bedroom, nine bathroom home backing onto English Bay was assessed at $78.8 million.
Nearly all 500 were in the Lower Mainland, with a few outliers on Vancouver Island (including a couple of private islands off the coast of Vancouver Island) and Whistler. To make the top 500, a home had to have a value in excess of $12 million.
The assessments, which will be arriving in the mail in the coming days, are already available online at www.bcassessment.ca. B.C. residents have until Jan. 31 to appeal their 2018 property assessment.
