"...as in the United States, local counsel is essential to understanding the tax system and use best means of pursuing a positive outcome..."

By Bradford Nixon, as published by Real Estate Forum, March 2013

The key to understanding ad valorem property assessment and taxation in Canada is to recognize that each province has its own unique system adhering to me basic principles of market value and equity. Each of the J 0 provinces has established a distinct regime of municipal assessment and property taxation. Although each province has different terminology, the general principle of market value derived from a value in exchange is consistently applied.

A second, crucially important principle which applies in nine of the 10 provinces (except Quebec) requires an equitable distribution of assessments and property taxes amongst similar properties. In the United States, this concept is known as uniformity.

Most provinces limit real estate tax levies to the assessed value of real property. Personal property is generally non-taxable in Canada except in Alberta, which taxes personal property in the oil and gas industry.

While the goal of the assessment is to obtain a correct current value as a conclusion, every individual taxpayer is entitled to an assessment that is equitable with comparable properties. As in the individual stales in the US, provincial legislation dictates how to properly determine the correctness and fairness of a property assessment. In a few provinces such as Ontario, the property tax system is complicated by tax caps and clawbacks, or legislative phase-ins of assessment increases or decreases.

Generally, each province provides taxpayers with a level of administrative appeal to a quasi-judicial tribunal, which is in turn subject to appeal on questions of law to the superior court of the province. The tribunals are independently appointed and usually separate from the local municipality. The assessment function may be performed by a provincial corporation in some cases, as it is in Ontario and British Columbia; or alternatively, the assessment roll may be prepared and defended by public or private sector agents of the local municipalities, as in Alberta, Manitoba and Quebec.

Each province has established its own set of exemptions from property taxation, which will include property owned by the federal and provincial governments or by churches, universities, schools and various nonprofit organizations.

Representatives performing assessment and tax services on behalf of taxpayers are coming under increasing scrutiny and regulation. For instance, in Quebec, only licensed appraisers may give opinion of value evidence before the assessment appeal tribunals.

In Ontario, only lawyers or paralegals licensed to provide legal services by the Law Society of Ontario may file and prosecute appeals.

Deadlines for assessment appeals will vary from province to province. For instance, in Ontario, there is an annual right of appeal and an appeal in the initial year of the four-year cycle will be deemed in effect for the subsequent 3 years, whereas in Quebec an appeal of the tri-annual assessment can only be made in the first year of the cycle. Knowing the local laws and practices are critical Thus, as in the United States, local counsel is essential to understanding the tax system and use best means of pursuing a positive outcome.

Brad Nixon is a partner in the Toronto law firm Walker Poole Nixon LLP, the Canadian member of American Property Tax Counsel, the national affiliation of properly tax attorneys. He may be contacted at bnixon@Wpnlaw.com. The views expressed here are the author's own.