Newbold town board hears update on skyrocketing property values

Newbold is slated for revaluation next year — and its town board heard eye-opening news relating to it in Jef Muelver’s monthly town assessor report at its May 14 meeting.

Muelver began by recapping the number of residential and commercial sales in the township in 2025: a total of 47.

“Total sales value was $16.3 million, and we had those properties’ assessed values totaling $8.4 million,” he said. “So the upward market trend continues, which now has pushed our aggregate ratio to just under 52 percent.”

With the addition of 2026 sales come revaluation time next year, “that will probably put us effectively in the 40 percentile range,” said Muelver. 

“So there’ll be some substantial value changes as a result of the revaluation” he said. “ … That level of assessment typically puts us at about the 45 to 50 percent range of increase in order to maintain a similar tax bill to this year. So the majority of properties will have that percentage of increase.” 

He noted that lakefront properties typically bear the majority of the increase in value. 

Muelver told the board he’s seeing the same trends across Oneida, Langlade and Oconto counties, although “Oneida County has been a few percentage points above some of the other areas as far as appreciation annually is concerned, according to the Department of Revenue.”

To illustrate property’s steep trajectory, he mentioned knowing of a number of 40s for sale and some with pending sales. 

“That’s a dry 40-acre parcel for $260,000 on average,” said Muelver. “In the early ‘90s they were $12,000.”

Of the townships he covers, he said in 2022 all were in compliance (having valuation within 10 percent above or below the state’s value). 

“And now I will be doing two revaluations for this year and five for next year,” he said. “So most of the towns have had appreciation at or near 20 percent, for over three consecutive years. And I’m sure this year will be the fourth.”

Town supervisor Mike McKenzie asked if the increase in value has any relationship to the school referendum.

Muelver said that wasn’t the cause. 

“Any calculations for any of the districts are equalized, so they’ll take our values per district,” he explained. “Revenue equalizes that value based on their sales analysis, and that’s what they use. At the same point when we revalue, we revalue based on their equalized values. So those districts are already sharing revenues and collections based upon equalized value, which is what we’re going to use at the point of the revaluation. So we’re not behind because of that.

“The only difference it makes is when we have a municipality with diverse property. We’re relatively diverse; we have on- and off-water property, so that’s diverse values. The only thing that does is, it puts some additional weight on the lower-valued properties because the difference in value between the off-water and the on-water isn’t caught up with the market. 

“But as far as the township as a whole is concerned, their dollar liability for those taxing districts is unchanged regardless of the level because it works through the equalization process.

That’s why they don’t make us revalue every year.”

Further coverage of the Newbold town meeting will continue in the May 22 edition of this newspaper.

Ardith Carlton may be reached at [email protected].