Definitions: Effective Year Built

Within our database of property information, most buildings have a year built field of data, which is the year the building was actually constructed. This is referred to as the "Actual Year Built".

Many county assessors also keep another version of the year built for use in their calculations of property value. This is called the "Effective Year Built", which attempts to factor in major improvements, remodels and repairs to the building, to compare the actual overall quality of the building to more accurately reflect the building quality. This "Effective Year Built" is for reference only, but may indicate if major remodeling has happened to a building.

For example, a home built in 1980, but added on to in 2020 might have an "Effective Year Built" of 2000...since it may be "effectively equal to" a partially a 1980 home and partially a 2020 home. An older building that is extensively remodeled may be "effectively" very close to a new building.

The actual calculation, weighting and factoring of adjustments varies from county-to-county based on their internal standards and software. Contact the local assessment authority for further details. "Effective Year Built" is not meant to indicate that any specific work happened to the building in the year indicated.