According to a retired BC Assessment appraiser, BC could be missing out on millions in property tax revenue because commercial properties are undervalued.

Derek Holloway, who has worked as an appraiser for 28 years, says several commercial properties across the province are valued millions of dollars below their selling price.

He cites as an example a property in Burnaby that was sold for $145 million, but whose value was estimated at only about half that.

“It’s a big, high-profile property,” he said.

“I took it to the appeals board, but they didn’t want to increase the assessment, so they sent it from the review board to the appeals board. The appeal cost $300 per property, so I didn’t go ahead. But BC Assessment said they had contacted the parties involved in the sale of that property and hadn’t heard back.”

Holloway says lack of response is not uncommon and that when they ask a homeowner, real estate agent or property manager for information, they often receive no response.

“It is an offence under the Assessment Act to ignore the BC Assessment, but if you do so there are absolutely no consequences,” he said.

He says it’s difficult to estimate how much revenue was actually lost due to the undervaluation. There are 200 different tax authorities in the province, and they all have their own tax rates.

“Suffice it to say, however, that some of the largest properties in these communities are the ones that are most likely to be undervalued because BC Assessment is not given access to the information that is critical to a proper valuation,” he said.

If larger companies do not pay their fair share, the burden will ultimately fall on smaller property owners, who will not be able to contest their amounts, which will ultimately harm everyone.

“Ultimately, everyone is crying out to save individual companies and reduce the tax burden, and that will then be passed on to private taxpayers,” he said.

“There is a cascading effect.”

BC Assessment needs to ask the provincial government, through the Ministry of Finance, to amend the Assessment Act and give it more “bite” to compel property owners to provide the requested information, he says.

According to Holloway, there is currently no meaningful punishment to solve the problem.

With files from Michelle Meiklejohn and Cole Schisler.