PENNSYLVANIA · COMMON LEVEL RATIO

Pennsylvania's Common Level Ratio, Explained

Most Pennsylvania assessments sit on a base year that is years or decades old. The common level ratio is what connects that number to what your building is worth today — and what decides whether you have an appeal.

How PA Appeals Work

July 1

New ratio takes effect each year

STEB

Sets each county's ratio annually

Counties, each with its own ratio

A commercial owner in Pennsylvania looks at an assessment of $1.2 million on a building worth $3 million and concludes there is nothing to appeal. That instinct is wrong, and the reason is the common level ratio. In most Pennsylvania counties the assessment is never supposed to equal market value — it is supposed to equal a specific fraction of it. Whether your assessment is too high depends entirely on whether it exceeds that fraction.

This guide explains where the ratio comes from, how to apply it in both directions, why it resets every July 1, and how it interacts with the uniformity argument that decides many commercial appeals. EPTA represents commercial owners across Pennsylvania, alongside Michigan, Indiana, Ohio, Wisconsin, and Georgia.

Why Pennsylvania Needs a Ratio at All

Pennsylvania does not require counties to reassess on any fixed schedule. The practical consequence is that county assessments are anchored to a base year — the year of the last countywide reassessment — and some of those base years are genuinely old. Allegheny County still assesses against 2012 values. Other counties are working from base years considerably further back than that.

Left alone, that would be indefensible: property values move, and an assessment frozen in 2012 bears no relationship to a 2026 sale price. The State Tax Equalization Board (STEB) solves it by measuring, each year and for each county, the actual relationship between assessed values and sale prices. That measured relationship is the common level ratio, and it is what lets an old base-year assessment be tested against a current market value.

USING THE RATIO

How the CLR Works in a Real Appeal

The ratio is simple arithmetic, but the order you apply it in determines what argument you end up making. Here is the sequence we use on every Pennsylvania file.

Find Your County's Current Ratio

STEB publishes a ratio for each of the 67 counties, and they differ substantially — a ratio that is right for Lehigh County tells you nothing about Erie. Pull the figure that is currently in effect for your county, and confirm which annual period it belongs to. Ratios are commonly published both as a percentage and as a reciprocal "factor," which is simply 1 divided by the ratio. Both express the same relationship; mixing them up inverts your entire analysis.

Run It Backward First — What Is the County Claiming?

Before estimating anything yourself, divide your current assessment by the CLR. That produces the market value the county is implicitly asserting your property has. This is the most clarifying number in a Pennsylvania appeal, because it converts an abstract assessment figure into a claim you can evaluate directly: would this building actually sell for that? If the answer is plainly no, you have a case worth developing.

Establish Present Market Value

Now build the other side. For commercial property this is usually an income approach — actual rents, actual vacancy, actual operating expenses, and a capitalization rate supported by market evidence. A recent arm's-length purchase is powerful evidence of value; so is a lender's appraisal, though it serves a different purpose and needs care. See our guide to cap rates and property taxes for how the income approach translates into an assessment argument.

Multiply Forward to the Correct Assessment

Market value times the CLR equals the assessment your property should carry. Compare that to the assessment it actually carries. The difference, multiplied by your millage rate, is the annual tax at stake — and that figure tells you whether an appeal is worth the effort before you commit to one. A gap of a few percent rarely justifies a filing; a gap of twenty percent on a substantial commercial parcel usually does.

Check the Uniformity Angle Separately

Market value is one argument. Uniformity is another. Under Article VIII, Section 1 of the Pennsylvania Constitution, your property may not be assessed at a higher effective ratio than comparable properties. If similar buildings in your county sit at a materially lower effective ratio than yours, that is an independent basis for relief — one that survives even where the county's view of market value is defensible. Commercial owners frequently have both arguments, and they are worth evaluating on their own terms.

Time the Filing Against the July 1 Reset

Because a new ratio takes effect every July 1 and the main filing deadlines fall on August 1 and September 1, the freshly published ratio is the one your appeal will be argued on. When the ratio drops year over year, the same market value supports a lower assessment than it did twelve months earlier — which occasionally turns a marginal appeal into a clear one. Our Pennsylvania deadline guide covers the filing calendar in detail.

TESTING YOUR ASSESSMENT

Common Level Ratio Self-Check

Run these before deciding whether to file. The CLR analysis takes an afternoon and tells you whether an appeal is worth pursuing at all — which is far better than finding out after the deadline.

I have my county's current common level ratio and know which annual period it covers

I divided my assessment by the ratio to see the market value the county is claiming

I built an independent market value estimate from income, sales, or both

I multiplied that value by the ratio to find the assessment I should be carrying

I converted the gap into annual tax dollars using my actual millage rate

I checked whether comparable properties sit at a lower effective ratio than mine

I confirmed my county's filing deadline and that the current ratio applies to it

COMMON LEVEL RATIO FAQ

What Pennsylvania Owners Ask About the CLR

The common level ratio (CLR) is the ratio of assessed values to actual market values in a given county, calculated annually by the State Tax Equalization Board from that county's real estate sales data. Because most Pennsylvania counties assess against an old base year rather than current value, the CLR is the bridge between the two: multiply present-day market value by the CLR and you get the assessment the county should be carrying. It is the single most important number in a Pennsylvania appeal, and it is the reason a Pennsylvania assessment cannot be judged by comparing it to market value directly.

Every year, effective July 1. STEB certifies each county's ratio from the prior year's sales data, and the new figure applies from July 1 through June 30 of the following year. The timing is convenient: the new ratio lands just before the August 1 and September 1 filing deadlines, so the appeal you file this season is argued on a ratio published weeks earlier. A ratio that drops year-over-year is good news for owners, because it lowers the assessment that a given market value supports.

Two multiplications. First, form an honest opinion of your property's current market value. Second, multiply that figure by your county's current CLR — the result is the assessment your property should carry. If your actual assessment is meaningfully higher than that number, you have the beginning of an appeal. Working the other direction is just as useful: divide your current assessment by the CLR to see what market value the county is implicitly claiming your building is worth. Owners are often startled by that number. Our assessment vs. market value guide walks through the arithmetic.

Far less than elsewhere. Philadelphia assesses under the Actual Value Initiative, where the assessed value is meant to equal current market value directly rather than a fraction of it. That makes the ratio largely beside the point in the city: a Philadelphia appeal argues market value itself. In the other 66 counties, where base years can be decades old, the CLR does the heavy lifting. Allegheny County is the clearest example — it still assesses against a 2012 base year, so the gap between assessment and present value is bridged entirely by the ratio.

Article VIII, Section 1 of the Pennsylvania Constitution requires that taxes be uniform upon the same class of subjects. In assessment practice this means your property may not be assessed at a higher effective ratio than comparable properties in the county — and the CLR is the yardstick that measures it. A uniformity argument is distinct from a market-value argument: even if the county's view of your building's worth is defensible, an assessment sitting well above the common level is vulnerable. Commercial owners often have both arguments available, and the stronger one is not always the obvious one.

THE RATIO DECIDES WHETHER YOU HAVE A CASE

Let Us Run the Ratio Analysis on Your Pennsylvania Parcel.

We'll apply your county's current common level ratio to your assessment, estimate present market value, and tell you in plain numbers whether an appeal is worth filing.

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Reviewing assessment documents to apply Pennsylvania's common level ratio