my name is carmen chiu, san francisco's elected assessor. in our seven mile by seven mile city, we have over 210,000 properties and close to 90% of their are residential like the homes you and i live in, so you might ask, how can we possibly value all these properties? well, to better understand our work, we need to explain the state's proposition 13 law. in 1978, california voters passed proposition 13. under prop 13, we value your property at market value when you first buy it. every year after, that value goes up by the c.p.i. or the california consumer price index. but if the c.p.i. is more than 2%, prop 13 caps the increase at 2%. we'll walk-through the maximum increases prop 13 would allow. let's take a home with initial value of $400,000. in the second year your assessed value grows by a maximum of 2%, growing from $400,000 to $408,000. in year three, that $408,000 is increased by 2% to roughly $416,000. every year, the value grows by the maximum rate of 2%, and that is called your prop 13 value. keep in mind as time goes by your prop