The Appraiser's Office has a wealth of information about real property and real property market activity in the county. All of this information is required for appraisers to do their jobs efficiently and effectively. At the same time, it can be a useful tool for a variety of other purposes and individuals both within and outside of the county appraiser's office.
All the information in the County Appraiser's Office is open to the public but for a few exceptions. One exception is that sales questionnaire information, according to Kansas law, is only available to the following people as specified in K.S.A. 79-1437f:
Effective July 1, 2006, licensed real estate brokers and realtors will be allowed access to real estate sales validation questionnaires (PDF).
(a) County officials for cooperating with and assisting the director of property valuation in developing the information as provided for in K.S.A. 79-1487, and amendments thereto;
(b) any property owner, or the owner's representative, for prosecuting an appeal of the valuation of such owner's property or for determining whether to make such an appeal, but access shall be limited to the contents of those questionnaires concerning the same constitutionally prescribed subclass of property as that of such owner's property;
(c) the county appraiser and appraisers employed by the county for the appraisal of property located within the county;
(d) appraisers licensed or certified pursuant to K.S.A. 58-4101 et seq., and amendments thereto, for appraisal of property and preparation of appraisal reports;
(e) financial institutions for conducting appraisals and evaluations as required by federal and state regulators;
(f) the county appraiser or the appraiser's designee, hearing officers or panels appointed pursuant to K.S.A. 79-1602 or 79-1611, and amendments thereto, and the state board of tax appeals for conducting valuation appeal proceedings;
(g) the board of county commissioners for conducting any of the board's statutorily prescribed duties; and
(h) the director of property valuation for conducting any of the director's statutorily prescribed duties.
A second exception is income and expense information that is provided by commercial property owners in the county. This information is used by county personnel to develop income models, but is not open to public inspection.
The types of public information that is available in the appraiser's office include: aerial photography and parcel identification maps; property characteristics, such as building size, age, style, etc.; property owner's names and addresses; property situs addresses; valuation history; agricultural land use and soil type; and personal property records and guides, etc.
The above information is stored in the county's computer system and , in most cases, in paper form. The real property records are filed by parcel identification number. A record can be located by using either the owner's name, address or parcel identification number. Personal property records are filed by owner's name.
Taxpayers can get a copy of their records at no charge. A fee is charged if taxpayers request copies of parcels or other information about properties they do not own. Copies of most records can be provided the day they are requested. However, requests that require research, a large amount of copying, or are on computer or in storage will be available within three working days of the request.