Long time residents of some of Toronto's hottest neighbourhoods are receiving their first property assessments in three years.

A semi-detached home owner in the Yonge and Eglinton area paid $150,00 for his semi-detached 20 years ago. His most recent assessment was $624,000, up some 36 percent from 2005 and 94 per cent from 2001.

The Valuation rolls were updated by the provincial Municipal Property Assessment Corporation based on market prices on Jan1, 2008.

Toronto's average assessment will increase 5.4 per cent. The majority of Toronto homeowners ( 57 per cent ) will come in under average with the remainder seeing higher valuations in the most trendiest Toronto Real Estate markets.

This market-driven assessment system introduced in 1998, is supposed to be understandable, transparent and have a good appeal system.

Two principles of taxation are missing however, the ability to pay and benefit received.

The first stop to dispute an assessment of their higher property valuations would be the Municipal Property Assessment Web site, http://www.mpac.ca/

Current Toronto Mls Listing in the downtown area in the picture ( C01 ) can be found on my Toronto Real Estate Web site that includes Condos, Lofts and Townhouses for sale.