Assessments for parcels of agricultural land of 100 acres or more went up an average of 57 percent.

ISLE OF WIGHT - An average 5.5 percent real estate assessment increase this year must have been easier for residents to swallow than the 41.7 percent increase from 2006.

About 500 people attended hearings or sent letters or e-mails or made phone calls about their assessments this year. Last time, it was at least twice that many, said Steve Wampler. He's president of the Wampler-Eanes Appraisal Group, the Roanoke-area firm that handled the assessments this year and in 2006. The county reassesses real estate every two years.

Wampler told the Isle of Wight County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday that residents who appealed their property values will receive notices in July indicating whether the values changed.

Across the county, the biggest change in values was in farmland. Parcels of agricultural land of 100 acres or more went up an average of 57.1 percent. Agricultural parcels of less than 100 acres went up 40.7 percent.

Commercial property was up 10.5 percent, and multifamily property was up 14.1 percent. The values are still subject to change until the Board of Assessors finalizes the information later this month.

While it might look profitable to sell farmland, the county is striving to preserve its agricultural land.

The county launched a program to buy development rights from farmers in exchange for placing conservation easements on their land, established agricultural and forest districts and targeted growth in development service districts to keep development pressure out of rural areas, to name a few initiatives, County Administrator W. Douglas Caskey said.