Arizona Real Estate Notebook

Ah, geek humor.

You can really get some fun effects when it’s 3 places off. Here’s a true life case from Minnesota.

Said the concerned public official: “This is not an ‘oops.’ I hate to differ, but yes, this is the technical definition of “oops.” This is the equivalent of thinking you won the Powerball and running up every credit card you have

“Lundgren said the trouble began in August when a clerk went into Mattson’s file to change the designation of the property, at 233 Lake St. E., from homestead to non-homestead to reflect its change in status after its sale.

“The clerk filled in the $18,900 proposed valuation, but then mistakenly hit the key to exit the program. The computer added four zeros to fill out the nine numerical spaces required by the software, thus indicating the value was $189,000,000.”

This generated new estimates of increased property tax revenues.

“Those three entities — which were counting on the $2.5 million in increased property tax collections — now face the daunting task of raising taxes or cutting budgets to make up for the shortfall.”

Here’s an idea, tendered by a rank amateur at these sort of things. Do they have last year’s budget? Yes? Okay. Use that one.