CONCORD, NH — This week, city officials and a government contractor will begin a year-and-a-half process of examining and reevaluating all private properties in Concord.
The city’s assessing department and officials from Vision Government Solutions will request quick access to the insides and outsides of people’s homes, commercial buildings, nonprofits, churches, and other land holdings to examine them for reevaluation. The process should be complete sometime in late 2025. The city will release new evaluations of the 15,000-plus properties sometime in 2026.
Jonathan Rice, the director of real estate assessments for the city of Concord, said the surveys will begin in the South End and branch out from there. Canvassers will be in the field from 8 a.m. until 5 p.m.
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Stephen Whalen, a project manager for Vision, said homeowners and business owners alike will be given a letter about the process. The letters will contain police and administration contact information to confirm the employees and clarify the reevaluation process. Vision employees will have proper photo identification and neon vests while in marked vehicles, too.
Rice said Vision employees will seek permission to inspect properties, but residents can refuse access. In some cases, land will be viewed from off the property to ensure current configurations match data already accessible online on the city’s website.
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“We don’t want to be on any property the owner doesn’t want us welcome on,” he said. “We’re trying to verify information (to ensure) it matches the property cards.”
Interior examinations will verify the number of bedrooms, bathrooms, fireplaces, and other data. On the outside, inspectors will look for noticeable improvements like an expansion of the size of a home, an added shed, or an added deck or porch, not items like gutters added, a new driveway or paving on a residential property, or cosmetic improvements. Anything that adds overall value in building size, Rice said.
“It’s purely value work,” Rice said.
A property owner, he said, will determine what they will be allowed to inspect and can refuse inspection. If no one answers the door and there is a vehicle in the driveway and they think someone is home, they will presume refusal. If no one is home, they will perform a quick visual inspection from the front door and move on.
Whalen said the inside was more complicated than the outside. From the outside, inspectors can stand at the curb, compare anything new to the prior property card, and move on.
To view neighborhood reevaluation information, click on this link.
A follow-up letter may be sent to property owners, including homes or properties with “No Trespassing” signs, to schedule appointments. Canvassers may also return to the house later in the day while scanning properties in the same neighborhood.
Rice said, absent verification, the investigators would make estimates. The state Department of Revenue Administration will then review the work of the assessing department.
Both Rice and Whalen said the process should be relatively quick.
Whalen estimated most inspections would take five to 10 minutes, adding, “We’re not opening drawers or looking into closets … it’s pretty quick, and a lot of times, the vast majority of information on the property is already recognized. It’s not like you get there, and it’s totally different.” He said there would be two employees at first and up to four or five since the company also works in other communities nearby.
When addressing privacy concerns, hoarding, or other issues, both Whalen and Rice said inspectors would not be taking notes about how people live unless it was clearly apparent they were in danger.
Some residents fear the reevaluations will raise their taxes. Rice said the assessing department does not set tax rates, does not bill, and does not collect taxes. It only assesses and sets property values. After creating a budget estimate, a tax rate is set based on a formula of compiling the taxable property values and figuring out a per thousand-dollar rate.
Municipalities are in the business to break even, “so your budget is your expense; that total budget is divided by the total assessment,” Rice said. He used a pizza slice analogy — if it is cut into four pieces, they split it 25 percent. If there were four new taxpayers, it would be cut by eight pieces, each paying 12.5 percent, which shows the importance of adding new real growth or market growth. The budget was the same but changes in valuations will shift the amount of money paid by residential, commercial, and industrial property owners.
“There can be shift,” he said, noting residential was very hot and had not been reevaluated since 2021. Property values will go up and down based on the market adjustment. The total assessment, whatever it is, will be used in the tax rate setting in 2026. It is all a snapshot in time, Rice said.
“It’s an impossible question to answer,” he said.
Whalen pointed to new office buildings or apartments being built, which increases a community’s total property assessment and value. This could lead to lower taxes due to the expanded properties. If an addition is built on a home, he noted, the property expands in value, paying more in property taxes. Rice said income from commercial, industrial, and apartments, too, could be used during the valuation process, which expands the value of those properties even if the information was not available on the city’s website due to privacy issues.
The effective rate of value is set on April 1.
Projects under construction will be rechecked at that time to see if they are completed, Rice said.
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After completing the assessments, any positive or negative changes will be entered into the city’s database. In April 2026, Vision should have all its field inspections done. New models and base rates will be created at that time for land and buildings and a whole new value will be developed, Rice said. Sometime, probably the November 2026 tax bill, residents and business owners will see the new evaluations.
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