Arizona’s Notice of Valuation

Once a year the county assessor sends every owner of record a notice of valuation. It states three things, and you need all three to work out whether you have a case: the full cash value, the limited property value, and the property class.

When it arrives

The county assessor notifies each owner of record, on any date BEFORE MARCH 1, of the property's full cash value and limited property value to be used for assessment purposes. On the same date each year the assessor certifies the mailing date to the board of supervisors and the department — that certified date is what the petition window runs from. The director may extend the mailing date beyond March 1 by not more than 30 days for an act of God, flood, fire or declared emergency, and the extension applies to all property valued by the assessor.

Stated date: Before March 1 (extendable by up to 30 days by the director for a declared emergency) · Basis: fixed date

Two details of that rule matter more than the date itself. First, the law requires the assessor to certify the mailing date to the board of supervisors and the department each year — which is why the deadline printed on your notice can be relied on, and why an appeal deadline is not simply “sixty days from March 1”. Second, the mailing date can lawfully move: the director may extend it beyond March 1 by up to thirty days for an act of God, flood, fire or a declared emergency, and an extension applies to all property the assessor values.

The amended notice: a second notice, and a new sixty-day window

Within 60 days after the mailing of the notice of valuation, the assessor may AMEND the notice if property characteristic data applied to a neighborhood or classification grouping produced an incorrect opinion of value; amended notices are typically sent in late September. An amended notice restarts the 60-day petition window, which is why an owner who has already filed should check whether a later notice was issued.

Anchor: the mailing date of the original notice of valuation · Basis: rule tied to an event

This is the part of the Arizona calendar that owners are least prepared for, and it cuts both ways:

• If a second notice arrives, your window moved. The petition must be filed within sixty days after the mailing of the notice or the amended notice, so a late-September amended notice gives you a new deadline rather than an expired one. Check whether one was issued before assuming you are out of time.
• If you already filed, the valuation may change anyway. An amended notice is the assessor correcting a value that neighborhood or classification data had produced incorrectly, and it can move in either direction. Read the new figures rather than assuming they match what you appealed.

A note on what the notice is not: it is not a tax bill, and it does not contain rates. Tax rates are set later — in Pima County the board of supervisors sets them on the third Monday in August — and the statement of taxes is mailed separately in September. The notice you receive now is about value and classification, which is exactly what an appeal can address.

Worked example (illustrative)

Illustrative sequence only. Your own mailing date is the one printed on your notice.

1. Late February: the notice of valuation arrives showing a full cash value of $400,000, a limited property value of $315,000, and class three.
2. Within sixty days of that mailing: the deadline to file a petition for review with the assessor. The date is printed on the notice.
3. Late September (possible): an amended notice of valuation arrives. The sixty-day window runs again from that mailing, so the deadline you had assumed has been replaced.
4. August 15: if you asked for a meeting with the assessor, this is the outside date for the assessor to consider, decide and answer your requests.

What this tells you: diarise the petition deadline from the notice in your hand, then check once more in the autumn whether an amended notice was issued.

What it does not tell you: whether your value is correct, or whether the class is right. Those are appeal questions — and the classification question has real money attached, because class three receives a state aid to education reduction on the bill that class four does not.

Where to go next

• The petition for review — the 60-day filing, the form, and the two appeal routes.
• Evidence for an Arizona appeal — what the petition itself must contain.
• Arizona deadlines — the full calendar, including the two payment halves.