Daily Beast: “When Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R-GA) and her husband, Jeffrey Sprecher, bought a 15,000-square-foot Atlanta mansion known as ‘Descante’ for $10.5 million in 2009, it was the most expensive private home purchase in the city’s history. The value of the estate, as appraised by Fulton County government officials for the purpose of calculating annual property tax dues, remained the same, $10.5 million, for the next seven years. Then, in 2016, the appraised value suddenly plunged to $4.15 million – a whopping 60 percent decline. The result was a dramatic cut to the couple’s property tax bill.”

“Originally, they were paying $200,000 annually to the city and county governments. In 2016, after their home’s value dropped, they paid $90,000. Since then, the appraised value of the home has risen to roughly $5 million, but they are still paying about $80,000 less a year than they did when they first bought. In 2018, the home was valued at $5.5 million, and the couple paid $115,000 in property taxes for that year. In 2020, the home was valued at $5 million, with a tax bill of $112,000. The devaluation of the Loeffler-Sprecher estate, and lower tax bill, came after the couple invested significantly in improvements to the property. In 2015, they spent nearly $90,000 to renovate the kitchen, $150,000 to construct a new greenhouse, and $125,000 on various outdoor improvements, records filed with the city show. And it’s especially striking given that Atlanta was undergoing a real-estate boom at that time. Home prices in the metro area surged by 81 percent from 2012 to 2020, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.”