What is a Valuer General and What do they do?

The Valuer General is a state official, or independent statutory officer, who values property.

The role of the valuer general

The role of the Valuer General’s office is to provide fair and transparent land values, and to offer specialist valuation and property advice to government.

State-run offices

It’s a state and territory administered system, so while duties and responsibilities are similar across the country, each state office is run independently.

The Valuer General’s office or equivalent has several duties:

• collecting and collating market data
• producing reports
• providing historical data
• issuing landholders with a Notice of Valuation at regular intervals

Why do we need land values?

Land values are just that: the value of the land, and any improvements that have been made to it. Although sold prices are partly used to calculate them, land values themselves are not ‘sold’ prices. And accurate land values are needed for many reasons.

They are needed for rating and taxing purposes; for calculating fair compensation in cases where land is being compulsorily acquired; and for working out council, water and sewerage rates, as well as state land taxes or leasehold rentals.

The Valuer General doesn’t set the taxes or rates, but the data on land values they collect and supply are used by the relevant authorities to set these charges.

Some states and territories, such as SA, issue land valuation statements to landholders annually, while others have moved to two, three or four-year cycles to cut costs and increase efficiency.

How is land valued?

Valuers working for the Valuer General’s office, or equivalent, in each state and territory take many things into account when setting land values.

Firstly, the Valuer General refers to their property database, and monitors sales of all property types.

They research the property market, trends and sales information for each land use category (residential, commercial, industrial and rural).

They carry out inspections, take into consideration zoning and the land’s present use, and analyse the land’s physical attributes (like topography, elevation, flooding, mining) and any possible constraints on its use (like existing or planned services, planning restrictions, heritage or contamination issues).

In return, landholders have the legal right to object to notices of valuation, and objection processes exist in each state or territory for those who feel their land has been either under or, more commonly, over valued.

What can you find out?

If you’re a landholder, you will be automatically issued with a land valuation statement at regular intervals for any property you own.

Valuer General’s offices around the country also offer various free and paid products and reports on individual properties, as well as more general market reports. Their data is also used by third parties.

Not all information is public

While the Valuer General’s office collects and collates information on sold prices, this information is not always easy for the general public to access.

For instance, in NSW, the Valuer General obtains property sales information from Notices of Sale lodged with Land and Property Information (LPI), but they only release it via several appointed and authorised property sales information resellers, like RP data, who then collate and charge for the information.

The situation is similar in Victoria, where property sales information is made available through Landata to valuers, real estate agents and people who have lodged an objection against a council valuation or whose property is subject to compulsory acquisition by the State Government.

Valuer General in the news

The office of Valuer General has been the subject of some recent controversy over the transparency of valuations.

In 2013, a parliamentary inquiry into land valuations in NSW recommended abolishing the office of the Valuer General and replacing it with a Valuations Commission run by the state Ombudsman and a parliamentary committee, to increase transparency and fairness for landholders.

Criticisms raised during the inquiry included inaccurate land values, concerns over trust and transparency, and a general lack of public understanding about the process of land valuations.

But there has also been some good news, too. In 2013, SA appointed Delfina Lanzilli as the first female valuer-general in Australia, bringing much media attention to the office and the role performed by the Valuer General.