Starting next year, York County officials will be on the hunt for homeowners who aren’t at home. The county assessor’s office will take bids next month for a countywide audit of its property tax receipts to identify any homes receiving the owner-occupied discount when in fact the owner does not live in the house. Second homes or rental properties have to pay a heftier tax bill than homes where the owner is living full time.

Assessor Teresa Simmons said an auditing firm will be able to cross-check homeowners’ listed primary residence against voter registration, real estate records, and car tax and driver’s license information, whether inside or outside of South Carolina, to find out where a taxpayer is really staying.

Several counties have done similar legal residence audits in recent years. The issue of unoccupied homes most often comes up in coastal areas with a lot of vacation property or counties with military installations where service members may be deployed for long periods of time. But anywhere a property owner keeps a second home, state law requires him or her to pay a higher tax rate, as much as three times what an owner-occupier would pay.

In Rock Hill, for example, a homeowner living in a $250,000 home would owe $2,100 in local property taxes. The tax bill increases to $5,725 if the owner is not using the house as a primary residence.

If the audit uncovers a home claiming the exemption is not owner-occupied, depending on how long the homeowner has claimed the exception, York County could revise owner’s bill and claim back taxes for up to three years prior to the home being ruled ineligible for the exemption.

Some of those claiming the exemption may have made an honest mistake or there’s some error in the tax records, Simmons said. If the assessor’s office wasn’t notified of a death, for example, the office might collect a lower tax on the home of a deceased person unless the deed is changed in probate court.

Others are more deliberate in claiming a tax exemption on two different houses, especially if they own a home out of state. A homeowner may claim an exemption on a home in South Carolina, Simmons said, but auditors find their vehicle is registered in another state with a lower or no car tax.

“You may have a home here in York County under your name, and a home in your wife’s name somewhere else,” the assessor said. “So these auditing firms have ways of searching for people you’re associated with.”

For now, the York County assessor’s office mostly relies on neighbors or homeowners associations to report suspected abuses. But in nine other South Carolina counties that have performed similar residency audits, Simmons estimates local governments have reaped between $355,000 and $3.1 million in additional revenue.

Any extra revenue generated by the audit will likely benefit York County’s four school districts, which are prohibited by South Carolina’s Act 388 from taxing owner-occupied homes for school operations costs, but can tax rental and vacation properties.