Meiers v Valuer-General

[2012] QLC 19

LAND COURT OF QUEENSLAND

CITATION:

Donald Neil Meiers and Florence Myrtle Meiers v Valuer-General [2012] QLC 0019

PARTIES:

Donald Neil Meiers and Florence Myrtle Meiers
(appellants)

v.

Valuer General
(respondent)

FILE NOs:

LVA004-12

DIVISION:

Land Court of Queensland

PROCEEDING:

Appeal against valuation under the Land Valuation Act 2010.

DELIVERED ON:

4 May 2012 [Ex tempore]

DELIVERED AT:

Bundaberg

HEARD AT:

Bundaberg

MEMBER:

Mr PA Smith

ORDERS:

1.     The appeal is dismissed.

CATCHWORDS:

Evidence – expert witness – same person acting as advocate – undesirable practice – Australian Property Institute (API) rules prohibit – limited weight given to expert opinion.

Practice and Procedure – onus of proof – presumption of correctness not carried over to Land Valuation Act 2010 – test is now ‘balance of probabilities’.

Valuation  - valuation methodology – same market for rural residential and farming lands – subject ‘rural residential’ based on rural residential sales – relativity with farming lots advisable but not essential.

Practice and Procedure – no power of Court to change valuations of lands not before Court even if proven incorrect – recommendation to Valuer-General only alternative.

APPEARANCES:

Mr Donald Neil Meiers, self represented

Mrs Thea Johnson, Counsel for the respondent

Background

1. This decision relates to an appeal by the appellants, Mr and Mrs Meiers, against a valuation by the respondent, the Valuer-General, pursuant to the Land Valuation Act2010, (the LVA), which valued the appellants' property situated at Careys Road, Meadowvale, (the subject land), in the sum of $165,000, as at 1 October 2010. The appellants contend for a valuation of $65,000.

2. The subject land has been valued as a rural residential site.[1] It should be noted that the land is valued as unimproved land pursuant to the provisions of the LVA, which now separates land valued as site value land and land valued as unimproved land. The land in question has a rural zoning.

   [1]     See Exhibit 4, page 3, point 19, which is the valuer's report.

The Subject Land

1. The subject land is described as Lot 1 on Registered Plan 50819, parish of Tantitha, with an area of 15.09 hectares. The property is located approximately 16 kilometres by road, or about 10 kilometres radially north east of Bundaberg.

2. Access is bitumen surface to within approximately 800 metres of the subject land, with the balance being formed gravel via Careys Road. Careys Road forms the southern boundary of the property, while Arroes Road, is a dedicated road along the southern most 500 metres of the eastern boundary of the subject. Arroes Road is not a formed road.

3. Power is available to the subject property. The property is of a largely elongated, rectangular shape, which can be referred to as irregular to the western side, in that the boundary has a significant kink in it. It has a frontage of approximately 180 metres and a depth of approximately 940 metres.

4. The property is intersected by a tributary of Splitters Creek, which runs through the northern part of the property from the…