Property Revaluation Coming In Manchester

MANCHESTER, NJ — Manchester Township will undergo a property value reassessment in 2025, and began preparations for it with contract approvals at Monday's Township Council meeting.

The Manchester Township Council introduced an ordinance to appropriate $850,000 to pay for the reassessment. The second reading and public hearing on the ordinance is set for the Nov. 13 council meeting.

Manchester last underwent a township-wide property value reassessment in 2020, township tax assessor Martin Lynch said. However, the town's property values have fallen to 64.93 percent of the market value, he said, making it likely that Ocean County will order a reassessment.

Lynch said the township is beginning the process now because it will reduce the impact that updated values will have, particularly for those residents whose homes go up significantly in value.

After a reassessment, the township's property tax levy shares are rebalanced, with one-third of property owners seeing an increase in their taxes, one-third seeing a decrease and the remaining third seeing no change.

The township is planning the reassessment now to lessen the impact for those whose property values increase their share of the township's property tax burden.

"The longer you wait, the greater the disparity in the values, and the greater the impact," Lynch said Monday night in reply to a resident's question. "If we correct it now, the impact on residents will lessened."

Property values across Ocean County skyrocketed during the pandemic, as hundreds of people moved to the county away from the cities and worked from home.

Lynch said the plan moving forward will be to update property assessment data yearly to keep them closer to market value.

"The plan I proposed five years ago, to reassess every five years and inspect 20 percent of the town every year was not implemented under the prior administration," he said. "By maintaining inspection data we won't have to do this huge reassessment process ever again."