Tax appeals are expected to reach a decade high in Utah's most populous county. Officials have tallied more than 6,100 so far - the deadline to file was Monday - but boxes upon boxes are still waiting to be counted.

Assistant Tax Administrator Liz Fehrmann says this year's volume easily will top 10,000. That would amount to more property-tax appeals than at any time since 1997, when officials heard 10,650 claims. Last year, the county logged nearly 8,400.

Predicts Fehrmann, "We will be extra busy this year."

Why the surge? It appears that this year's leaps in land values had much to do with it. Some people saw their lot prices shoot up by tens of thousands of dollars. Meanwhile, housing prices plunged about as much.

The Assessor's Office explained the change like this: Land values went up to better reflect the market. House values had to go down, as a matter of bookkeeping, to show what the overall property is worth.

In short, for many homeowners, their land appreciated, their building depreciated, and the result was a bottom-line assessment that supposedly matched what the property would sell for.

"We're not setting the market," Assessor Lee Gardner insisted earlier this summer, "we are just describing what is happening in the market."

Then again, the flood of appeals could reflect Utah's peculiarity in the real-estate market. While housing prices have plummeted nationally, the assessor maintains Salt Lake County has seen a 3 percent increase.

Right or wrong, Fehrmann says, "it is not the general population's perception."

jstettler@sltrib.com