about Property Tax watchdog
Experience You Want. A Fee You’ll Appreciate.
Property Tax Watchdog represents Nassau County homeowners who are paying more in property taxes than they should.
Our team brings 30+ years of experience to every filing.
We know the process, we know what to look for, and we know how to fight for the reductions our clients deserve.
That experience shouldn’t come at a premium.
Our fee is 30% of what we save you — others charge 40–50% — and nothing at all if we don’t win.
HOW GRIEVING YOUR ASSESSMENT WORKS
IN NASSAU COUNTY
A property tax grievance is the process of challenging your assessed value — the number your school and general levy bills are calculated from. All else being equal, a lower assessed value means a lower tax bill.
Each January, the Nassau County Assessment Department notifies homeowners of their property’s tentative assessed value for the tax year beginning twenty-one months later. In January 2027, for example, Nassau homeowners will receive their Notice of Tentative Assessed Value for 2028/29 — the assessment year that starts with the first-half school bill in October 2028.
New York State law gives you the right to challenge that value, whatever it is and however the Assessment Department arrived at it. You can do it yourself, or you can have someone represent you.
What we do
We represent you first before the Nassau County Assessment Review Commission (ARC), the independent body that can either offer a lower final assessed value or leave the tentative value unchanged. An ARC result typically comes 6 to 18 months after filing.
If ARC doesn’t make a satisfactory offer and we think we have a case worth arguing, we may also represent you at Small Claims Assessment Review (SCAR) in New York State Supreme Court. SCAR hearings happen over the summer, before the tax year begins in October.
Either way, a successful grievance means you pay less than you otherwise would — starting with the October first-half school bill, and continuing through the second-half school bill and both general levy bills the following year.
Why a grievance can’t cost you money
Because a grievance is won before the assessment year starts, the savings sit on top of whatever else changes from one year to the next.
If your taxes were headed for a $1,000 increase and a grievance saves you $800, you see a $200 increase instead. If they were headed for a $100 decrease and a grievance saves you $200, your taxes drop by $300.
We bill on savings, not on the year-over-year change in your taxes. So a successful grievance can never cost you more than it saves.
How savings are calculated
Savings are the difference between the taxes owed at the corrected assessed value we won, and the taxes that would have been owed at the value that would otherwise have stood.
You’ll see what you owe on your property tax bills and on the County Land Records Viewer. What you’ll never see there is what you would have owed without the grievance — so we recalculate your bills at the assessed value we defeated, whether that’s your tentative value, adjusted tentative value, or a final value issued before we won at SCAR.
We do that math before billing and check it to the dollar. Full line-by-line calculations are available on request.
What We Charge
Our fee is 30% of savings — at ARC or at SCAR. Many other firms charge 40-50% fees.
We bill for the first year of savings only. The benefit of a reduced assessment can carry forward for years, there is no fee for the benefit carried forward.
There’s no auto-renewal: signing up covers one assessment year, and that’s it.
We’ll reach out each fall to ask whether you’d like us to file again.
There’s no downside to doing so, and the upside compounds.
Getting Started
All we need is a signed authorization form. You can apply online, or call us and we will send one to you.
We’re currently filing for the 2028/29 assessment year — the year that begins with your first-half school bill in October 2028 and runs through September 2029.
The ARC filing deadline is March 1, 2027.
If you miss the County imposed deadline, the chance to challenge your assessment for that year is gone.
What happens next
Once we have your authorization, we’ll send a confirmation letter within about a week. Then we file with ARC before the deadline, receive a determination by no later than March 2028, and go to SCAR over the summer of 2028 if it’s warranted.
Savings, if any, begin with the first-half school bill in October 2028. Our bill for service, if any, doesn’t come due until early 2029 — after you’ve already had at least half the savings in hand.
Reach us by email at [email protected], by phone at (516) 426-7674, through our contact form, or by mail at:
Property Tax Watchdog 1225 Franklin Ave, Suite 500 Garden City, NY 11530
FAQ
Before You Sign Up
30% of what we save you — the same rate whether we win at ARC or at Small Claims Assessment Review. Most firms in this business charge a higher rate at SCAR. We don’t.
If your case goes to small claims court, there’s a $30 filing fee imposed by the court. That money goes to the court rather than to us, and it may or may not come back to you later.
We bill on the first year of savings only. A reduction often carries forward well beyond that — we don’t charge for any of it. And the bill doesn’t arrive until you’ve already seen at least half the savings land on your tax bills.
Nothing. You owe us nothing at all. There’s no signup fee, no filing fee, and no charge for our time. We only get paid when we lower your assessment.
No. An assessment review can only lower your assessed value or leave it where it is. There’s no scenario where challenging it results in a higher number.
Yes. Homeowners are entitled to file on their own behalf and some do it successfully.
That said, filing well takes time, comparable sales data, and familiarity with how ARC and small claims court actually work. Homeowners who file alone often don’t get the reduction they could have. We handle the paperwork, build the evidence, and negotiate the case — and if we don’t win, you owe us nothing either way.
Please don’t. Two firms filing on the same property creates duplicate representation, which the County has to untangle before your case can move. That takes time your case may not have, and it can cost you the reduction entirely.
If you’ve already signed with someone else this year, stay with them. We’ll be here next year.
No. If you know them, they’re helpful — but your property address is enough. We’ll find the rest.
Not at the moment. We’re focused on Nassau County residential property.
What Happens After You Sign Up
Roughly two years from signing to savings. Sign up in September 2026 for the 2028/29 assessment year, and any savings begin with the October 2028 school bill. Our invoice, if there is one, follows in early 2029.
It’s a slow process by design — the challenge has to be settled before the tax year it applies to even begins.
We’ll send you a confirmation within about a week. After that there’s nothing for you to do — we file with ARC before the March deadline and contact you when there’s a result. That may be several months, and no news in the meantime is normal.
No. Nobody from the County or from Property Tax Watchdog will visit your property. The whole process runs on records and paperwork.
No. We prepare every document and appear at every conference and hearing on your behalf. You won’t need to take a day off for this.
Yes — and this matters more than most people realize.
There’s exactly one filing window per assessment year. Miss it and that year is gone; there’s no appealing it later. Cases frequently run past the next year’s deadline, so waiting for last year’s result before filing again can quietly cost you a whole year of savings.
File every year. The two don’t interfere with each other.
Yes. We’ll work out a schedule that suits you, and we don’t add interest or late charges.
Your Assessment & Your Taxes
Yes. “Frozen” is a misleading word for what actually happens, which is that the County copies a value across from a previous year rather than calculating a new one.
A copied value is still a tentative value, it’s still what your taxes will be built on, and it can still be wrong. Your right to challenge it is exactly the same.
The County’s Land Records Viewer shows your school and general levy taxes. Two things it won’t show: village taxes, or city taxes.
Nobody can tell you that, including the County. Too much moves between now and then — budgets, rates, aid, levies.
Here’s what is predictable: whatever those numbers turn out to be, they get applied to your assessed value. Get that number down and you pay less than you otherwise would have, regardless of what else happens.
Your assessed value is only one of the numbers that determines your tax bill. School and municipal budgets, tax rates, state and federal aid, exemptions, abatements, even the number of households sharing the levy – all of it moves from year to year, and none of it is something a grievance can touch.
What a grievance does is lower the base that every one of those other numbers gets applied to.
The comparison that matters isn’t this year against last year. It’s what you pay against what you would have paid at the value we defeated. By that measure, a successful grievance always leaves you better off.
No. Exemptions and grievances work on different parts of your bill — an exemption is a break based on who you are, a grievance challenges what your property is assessed at. Winning one doesn’t affect the other.
In the rare cases where they do interact, we account for it before billing, so you’re never charged for savings that came from somewhere other than our work.
Yes, Definitely. Market values change year-to-year. New opportunities arise.
There is never a downside.
Filing has two outcomes:
1) Your case gets approved
2) Your case gets denied and you’ ve lost nothing for trying. Your assessment cannot be raised.
No. A grievance applies to a future assessment year, not one that’s already been billed. That’s why the process takes about two years — the challenge is settled before the tax year it affects begins.
Reaching Us
Phones are staffed Monday to Friday, 9 to 5. Certain times of the year call volume is high.
Leave a message if you don’t get through and we will return all calls.
READY TO
LOWER YOUR TAX BILL?
Two minutes now. Nothing to pay unless we win.