1. In all counties, except the City of St. Louis, the assessor shall be provided with two books, one to be called the “real estate book”, and the other to be called the “personal assessment book”.

2. The real estate book shall contain all lands subject to assessment. It shall be in tabular form, with suitable captions and separate columns. The first column shall contain the name of the owner, if known; if not, the name of the party who paid the last tax; if no tax has ever been paid, then the name of the original patentee, grantee or purchaser from the federal government, the state or county, as the case may be, opposite thereto; the second column shall contain the residence of the owner or, upon written consent of the owner filed with the assessor, an alternate address for the purpose of mailing ad valorem property tax statements to someone other than an owner, family trust, or mortgage holder receiving escrow payments; the third column shall contain an accurate description of the land by the smallest legal subdivisions, or by smaller parts, lots or parcels, when sections and the subdivisions thereof are subdivided into parts, lots or parcels; the fourth column shall contain the actual cash valuation. When any person shall be the owner or original purchaser of a section, quarter section or half quarter section, block, half block or quarter block, the same shall be assessed as one tract. The assessor shall arrange, collect and list all lands owned by one person in the county, under his name and on the same page, if there be room to contain it, and if not on the next and following leaf, with proper indications of such continuance, whether they be lots and blocks in a city, or sections or parts of sections in the country, the lowest numbered range, township and section, block, lot or survey always being placed first in such list, and so on in numerical order until said list for each property owner is completed. The assessor shall consolidate all lands owned by one person in a square or block into one tract, lot or call, and for any violation of this section, in unnecessarily dividing the same into more tracts than one or more lots than one, the county commission shall deduct from his account for making the county assessment, ten cents for each lot or tract not so consolidated. At the close of each owner’s list, the assessor shall place all the lands that appear to belong to the owner, which cannot be properly described by numerical order, as contemplated in this section, which shall be otherwise properly described, indicating the quantity and location thereof.

Ask a legal question, get an answer ASAP!
Click here to chat with a lawyer about your rights.

3. The personal assessment book shall contain a list of the names of all persons liable to assessment, alphabetically arranged with proper priority of vowels. The assessor shall set opposite their names the tangible personal property respectively owned by them. It shall be in tabular form, with suitable captions and proper columns; the first column shall contain the names of the persons assessed; the second column shall contain the residence, if in the city, the ward, addition and block, or, if outside an incorporated city or town, the township in the county; the third column shall contain the occupation of the party assessed; the fourth column shall contain each kind of property assessed; the fifth column shall contain the assessed value thereof; the sixth column shall contain the amount chargeable to each person, and there may be such other columns as are useful and convenient in practice.

4. Nothing in this section shall be construed to prohibit separate real estate and personal assessment books in all incorporated cities where they are necessary.