Portland will wait to implement a citywide property revaluation until next year because of the still unknown financial implications of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The City Assessor’s Office announced the delay Friday. The revaluation is Portland’s first in more than 15 years.

“Given the unknowns with the changes the real estate market will see from the pandemic, it would not be prudent to set new values for the April 1, 2020 assessment date. We will continue to analyze market data to see what trends emerge as this crisis continues and make necessary adjustments accordingly,” City Tax Assessor Christopher Huff said in a news release.

The final phases of revaluation were about to begin when the pandemic started. The city planned to send notices of new values to all property owners in May, and informal appeals would have started in June. That schedule will be delayed until 2021, and the city said a new timeline will be posted once the dates are set.

“Achieving uniform, fair and equitable property taxation is the paramount goal for our office, especially with a long overdue revaluation,” Huff said. “However, I feel the potential impact to market values from the pandemic outweighs this concern for the coming year. We would not be doing our due diligence if we did not take into account the market changes that develop.”