Email questions to cauv@coshoctoncounty.net
To view CAUV forms/applications: Forms & Links/Real Estate/CAUV
DEADLINES:
New Applications: After the first Monday in January to the first Monday in March.
Renewal Application: File with the County Auditor prior to the first Monday in March.
What does CAUV stand for?
Current Agricultural Use Valuation. CAUV gives commercially active farm land a reduction in real estate taxes. The reduction is for the land only. Any buildings and 1 acre around the home do not receive the reduction. New applications are accepted from the first Monday in January to the first Monday in March of each year. A non-refundable $25.00 application fee is due at that time. ALL new applications will be audited before the first tax reduction is given.
How To Qualify
- Must have 10 acres or more, unless there is/or will be a home site and then 11 acres are needed.
EXCEPTION: Farms of less than 10 acres can qualify, but they must produce a gross income of $2500 from the sale of agricultural products yearly. Documentation will be needed yearly-copies of receipts or a Schedule F from income tax return.
- The land has to have been devoted to commercial agricultural use during the three consecutive calendar years prior to the application year.
Commercial agricultural use includes: animal or poultry husbandry, aquaculture, apiculture, field crops, tobacco, fruits, vegetable, nursery stock, ornamental trees, flowers, sod or the production of commercial timber.
Commercial Timber: law does not detail what qualifies as commercial timber production. Coshocton County requires documentation of the following: a written Forestry Management Plan OR Federal tax return showing a timber business code or otherwise indicating owner is in the timber business. The farm will be periodically inspected to insure that the Forestry Management Plan is being followed or active commercial timber management is being implemented.
Christmas trees will qualify after the first harvest. Planning/planting stages do not qualify unless covered under a written Forestry Management Plan.
Government Set-Aside Program, Conservation Reserve Program (CRP), WRP, GRP, or CREP: land in any of these programs will qualify for CAUV. If you wish to receive the lower conservation soil values, you must show the acres under either conservation program or conversation practices and include contract, maps or written explanation as required by the application’s instructions.
Idle property may qualify if it meets certain criteria. Land may be idle for one year with a written explanation. The second year of being idle, the owner must show good cause before the Board of Revision. The property must return to commercial agricultural land the third year.
Renewal forms are automatically sent out each year once you are in the program and must be fully completed and returned to the auditor’s office by the first Monday in March to avoid being removed from the program. If the renewal form is not received by the deadline, the land will be removed from the CAUV program and recoupment charges from the past three years will be added to your real estate tax bill. Recoupment charges are what you have saved in taxes by being in the CAUV program.
If the ownership of CAUV land is changed or if any of the original owners’ names change, a new application will need to be completed and submitted with the $25 initial application fee. The new owner will receive a letter the following January from the Auditor’s office stating that they acquired land in the CAUV program and will be given the opportunity, if they qualify, to apply under their name.
LINKS:
2022 Current Agricultural Use Values (CAUV) Agricultural Advisory Committee Meeting (4/13/2022)
Ohio Society of American Foresters Directory
