The value of property in Gilroy increased by $565.5 million in 2017, a growth rate of 6.95 percent, slightly below the countywide rate, Santa Clara County Assessor Larry Stone reported. Overall, property in Gilroy was valued for tax purposes at $8.7 billion.
That’s good economic news and good news for local governments, but it could mean higher property tax bills for some.
Less than 10 years after the Great Recession, Stone reported that as of Jan. 1, 2018, the value of all property in the county increased by 7.34 percent in 2017 to $483.2 billion.
The value of property in Morgan Hill increased by $222.2 million, a 7.73 percent increase from the previous year. As of Jan. 1, property in Morgan Hill was worth a total of $3.1 billion.
The assessor’s annual report on the county’s property tax roll value, published on June 28, notes that the county’s property value growth in 2018 was led by the Bay Area’s continually growing high-tech sector. Most of that growth occurs outside South County.
The largest cogs running the Bay Area’s economic machine are Google, Apple, Samsung, LinkedIn and Nvidia. The economic tech dreadnought, Apple accounted for an increase of $1.5 billion, mostly from its Apple Park campus in Cupertino.
According to the press release issued by the Office of the County Assessor, as compared to the dot-com boom—which went bust 18 years ago—today’s high-tech businesses have used real earnings and profits to acquire land and buildings, rather than depend on long-term leases based on speculative earnings.
“Rebounding from the greatest economic downturn since the Great Depression, Silicon Valley’s economy has surged back to record levels,” Stone said in a press release. “Santa Clara County is well into the eighth year of recovery since the bottom of the recession in 2010. The turnaround is remarkable.”
Countywide unemployment, which rose to 11.2 percent in 2010, dropped to 2.3 percent in 2018. The shortage of capable high-tech workers has driven up wages, Stone said.
To accommodate the overall glut of workers, the need to expand office space and housing for these workers has grown as well.
“Employment growth during the past eight years has triggered an incredible demand for office and industrial space, apartments and homes,” Stone said. “The result has been a nearly two-thirds increase in the county’s net values.”
Rents continued to increase along with housing prices. According to Stone, rent for apartments in metropolitan San Jose has increased by 52 percent since 2010. In Santa Clara County, 68 percent of homes sold for more than the asking price and 22 percent of residential transactions were all cash, Stone said.
Starting on June 29, the Assessor’s Office began to mail annual assessment notices to 490,146 county property owners reporting each property’s assessed value, and a preview of this fall’s property tax bills. According to the assessor’s office, Santa Clara County is one of only nine counties in California that send early notice to property owners.
“Most property owners in California learn of their assessed value for the first time when they receive their property tax bill in October,” Stone said.
For more information or to dispute a property’s assessed value, visit sccassessor.org.
BY THE NUMBERS
- $483.2 billion: Total value of all Santa Clara County property as of Jan. 1
- $8.7 billion: Total value of all property in Gilroy as of Jan. 1
- 6.95: Percentage increase in Gilroy’s total value from 2017
