Rodney Stevens
The Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal IPART are reviewing the maximum prices that the Valuer General can charge for land valuation services to Councils from July 1, 2025, for a 6-year period and submissions from the community and stakeholders are invited.
Valuer General land valuations are used by Council’s across NSW as the basis for calculating and issuing rates notices to ratepayers, and currently Councils pay about one-third of the Valuer General’s total costs of providing valuation services, with the remainder of the costs covered by Revenue NSW.
The state’s 128 Council’s aren’t the only users of Valuer General land valuations, with a range of other users including Transport for NSW, Fire and Rescue NSW and the general public.
In May 2023, the state government appointed acting Executive Director of Valuer General NSW, Sally Dale as the first female Valuer General for NSW
The final Terms of Reference for IPART to review the Valuer General’s prices to NSW local government for the 6 years from July 1, 2025, was approved by NSW Premier Chris Minns.
Value NSW, the government agency withing the Department of Planning, Housing and Infrastructure that supports the Valuer General have changed the way they deliver valuation services since their last review by IPART in 2019, transitioning to a hybrid model to deliver valuation services through a mix of in-house and contracted valuers.
The Valuer General is proposing a step change price increase of between 21 and 38 per-cent depending on the pricing zone plus inflation, and to maintain the existing 4 pricing zones, Country, Coastal, Metro, and City of Sydney based on geographical location.
The proposal is that prices be set for a 6-year period.
The Clarence Valley is assessed by the Valuer General as being in the Coastal pricing zone with the 26,447 residential, commercial, industrial, rural, and other properties having a combined total land value in the Valuer General’s November 2021 report of $7,599,339,590.00.
This represented a 28.53 per-cent increase across the entire Clarence Valley Local Government Area in land values compared to the 2020 Valuer General’s land valuations.
IPART Tribunal Member Sharon Henrick said the review will determine how much councils will have to pay for the Valuer General’s land valuation services over the next six years.
“We’re seeking feedback from the local government and valuation sectors, from ratepayers and other users of land valuation services to help us decide what the Valuer General’s efficient costs are, what proportion of those costs should be recovered from councils and other users, and what an appropriate pricing model to recover these costs from councils would be,” she said.
“We are also interested in stakeholder views on how digital technology and artificial intelligence can improve the quality and reduce the cost of the valuations provided by the Valuer General.
“IPART has been asked to determine the Valuer General’s prices for councils only, as these are declared government monopoly services.
“We have not been asked to set prices for services delivered to other users of the Valuer General’s valuation services.”
To help conduct the review, IPART has produced a call for submissions paper which sets out some of the issues that will be considered and asks for feedback.
Submissions opened on October 8 and close on November 19, 2024.
For more information or to download a call for submissions paper visit https://www.ipart.nsw.gov.au/review/local-government-other-industries/review-prices-valuer-generals-services-councils-1-july-2025
To make a submission visit https://www.ipart.nsw.gov.au/Home/Reviews/Lodge-a-submission
A public hearing is scheduled to be held in March 2025 where stakeholders and members of the public will be able to provide feedback on the draft recommendations.