Sports clubhouses in city council area could face a sharp increase in rates

Rates on rugby, GAA and many other sports clubhouses in the Dublin City Council area may rise by 50 to 100 per cent next year, according to valuer Brian Bagnall of Bagnall & Associates.

Clubhouses and offices in the Dublin area are among the properties facing the steepest rises under a national revaluation of commercial and industrial properties which began with legislation in 2001.

Others to be hit include retailers in some of the streets off South Great George’s Street, which have become commercially vibrant in recent years.

Sports clubhouses with bars are not exempt from rates: Mr Bagnall believes that the Valuation Office (VO) thinks they were valued too conservatively up to now and is revaluing them accordingly.

Bagnall, one of a team of valuers from the Society of Chartered Surveyors Ireland (SCSI), says negotiations with the Valuation Office over the way in which rates are assessed are at a delicate stage, but hopes to have the bulk of them finished by August.

The valuers are collating evidence to convince the VO that rental values on many offices, based on transactional information around the valuation date of April 2011 – a very quiet time in the rental market – have been overstated.

Valuer Robert McHugh of DTZ Sherry FitzGerald agrees that not all businesses will see their rates bill rise in 2014 – but says his clients include one whose bill will jump by 90 per cent unless a representation is successful.

Long overdue
Most businesses agree that the revaluation of rates is long overdue.

Local authorities cannot get increased income as a result, as the purpose of the revenue neutral revaluation is to redistribute rates liability more equitably between ratepayers – some businesses will see their rates fall as others rise.

However, it comes at a difficult time for all businesses and bodies such as the Chambers of Commerce feel some recognition should be given to ratepayers’ ability to pay.

Valuation Certificates will be issued at the end of the year, and the valuation list published.

It is at this point that Dublin City Council will finally agree the multiplier – likely to be 0.264 – which determines exactly what rates a business will pay.

Many valuers disagree with the method they believe the VO has used to come to its initial valuations.

Mr McHugh says: “As a result of the lack of transactional information available to them in and around the valuation date of April 2011 . . . the VO has . . . grouped it with historic rental evidence from a much more active and better performing market in 2006, 2007 and 2008, applying a discount to reflect the downturn in the rental market.”

Brian Bagnall says that the SCSI has contacted all commercial agents to ask them for information on rental values for 12 months on either side of April 2011, information which it is using in its discussions with the VO.

“They are engaging with us in a real way, but the difficulty is the lack of evidence.”

All Dublin city ratepayers have now been issued with proposed valuation certificates and the 28-day deadline for making representations to the VO has long since passed. Somewhere between 25 and 43 per cent of the 21,000 ratepayers have done so.

Others may not have made representations because they are happy, says Bagnall, but others possibly just didn’t get information together in the relatively short time allowed.

Ratepayers will be issued with Valuation Certificates in December: under existing legislation, they have 40 days to lodge an appeal after they get their certificate, and can go to a Valuation Tribunal if still not satisfied.

Under legislation due to be passed before the Dáil's recess next month, the two-stage appeals process would be abolished – ratepayers not happy with their certificate will have only the tribunal to make their case to.

"Tone of the list"
Valuers are also concerned that the new legislation will mean that an appeal to the tribunal would be subject purely to the established "tone of the list", as compared to the emerging "tone of the list" as at present.

Robert McHugh says the “tone” is likely to be established by the 57 per cent of ratepayers who didn’t appeal their proposed valuation.

He maintains that the VO has significantly overstated some rental values and that many of those 57 per cent of properties could have been appealed.

Meanwhile, the first batch of proposed Valuation Certificates were sent to Waterford city and county ratepayers at the end of May.

This means that 1,700 of a total 4,500 proposed certificates should have been received by now.

Ratepayers have 28 days from the date of issue to make representations if they believe the proposed valuation is incorrect.

Under the national revaluation programme, revaluation of commercial and industrial properties has been completed in South Dublin County Council, Fingal County Council and Dún Laoghaire Rathdown County Council and is underway in Limerick city and county. It is due to start in Carlow, Kilkenny and Galway city later this year.