Les Services immobiliers Racine, Larochelle & Associés has forged a strong reputation in large-scale industrial and commercial property municipal assessment review and appeal.
We offer our clientele to verify, FREE OF CHARGE, if the municipal assessment of their property is adequate and if its different elements comply with the Act respecting Municipal Taxation and the most recent case law in the matter.
To offer our clients the best service available, we handle EVERY step involved in reducing the taxable value of their properties to help them save significant amounts of money. These steps include:
If reaching an agreement on the taxable property value with the municipal assessment service is impossible, we handle all the work involved in representing and preparing your case for Tribunal hearings on your behalf.
Les Services immobiliers Racine, Larochelle & Associés has developed unmatched expertise on municipal assessment of SINGLE USE buildings over the years.
Browse ourFrequently Asked Questions section for more information.
Declaring a building as SINGLE USE does not affect its value in any way. This only affects the timeline for review. However, to declare a building as such, the property must:
We review more than 200 properties each year, allowing our clientele to save several million dollars overall!
When the market value of your property needs to be assessed, whether for mortgaging, purchasing, disposal or selling purposes, we have the expertise to meet your every need.
Entrusting professionals to assess the insurable value of your property is a wise decision to reflect the situation of your property to its best. If too high, an inaccurate insurable value can lead to overly costly insurance premiums with no possibility of refund or collection in the event of a claim.
In the event of damage to your property, you will have to pay the difference between the value at which your building was insured and the actual cost of rebuilding it if your property was underinsured. This goes against the very purpose of insurance coverage.
The current and potential use of a property must be considered in terms of legal restrictions when assessing the amount of indemnity to be paid to expropriate a property. Les Services immobiliers Racine, Larochelle & Associés has the expertise for this particular kind of assessment. Our experts were actually hired to handle the two most recent major expropriation cases in Quebec. The first case involved the expropriation of more than 380 million square feet of land to expand Parc national du Mont-Orford in the Eastern Townships. The second case involved the expropriation of a 200,000 square-foot office building located in downtown Montréal as part of the CHUM’s modernisation project.
The International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) are accounting standards developed by the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) for publicly-listed companies or investors to harmonize the presentation of their financial statements.
The appraisal of assets at their true value mainly constitutes the logic behind these accounting standards. Our assessment services take on their full meaning in this context. After a client’s Board of Directors identifies the rules of presentation for their financial statements, we determine the true value of the client’s assets (buildings and equipment). This true value can be represented using a cost approach or an approach based on the market value of the client’s assets. The type of operations associated with the client’s assets often helps to identify the assessment approach to be used. It might also be significantly advantageous for the client to use the cost approach instead of the market value approach.
In addition to complying with these standards, it is important for the client to understand that the assessment of assets at their true value can have a significant impact on lending agencies and the businesses with equity interest in the client’s organization.
Since 1994, the Civil Code of Quebec requires co-ownership syndicates to establish a contingency fund for co-owned buildings. Although this fund is a legal requirement strictly reserved for major repairs or the replacement of shared building sections, it is often insufficient.
Obviously, an inadequate contingency fund will impact negatively the market value of the co-ownerships in the same building. If major work is needed on the short term and funds are insufficient to cover such expenses, a “special contribution” will be required of the co-owners. This may lower the price that a potential buyer will be willing to pay.
A contingency fund should be reviewed periodically. Since the condition of the different building components can change over time, we strongly recommend analyzing the contingency fund every five years to avoid unwelcomed surprises.
Our team includes professionals acknowledged as expert witnesses by the Tribunal in cases of municipal taxation and expropriation. Rest assured that we will make every effort to represent and defend your interests.
Feel free to contact us regarding any real estate question.