fair market value

The amount at which property would change hands between a willing buyer and a willing seller, neither being under any compulsion to buy or sell and both having reasonable knowledge of the relevant facts. By fair market value is meant the price in cash, or its equivalent, that the property would have brought at the time of taking, considering its highest and most profitable use, if then offered for sale in the open market, in competition with other similar properties at or near the location of the property taken, with a reasonable time allowed to find a purchaser. State, by Commissioner of Transp. v. Cooper Alloy Corp., 136 N.J.Super. 560, 347 A.2d 365, 368.

Fair market value is the price that the asset would bring by bona fide bargaining between well-informed buyers and sellers at the date of acquisition. Usually the fair market price will be the price at which bona fide sales have been consummated for assets of like type, quality, and quantity in a particular market at the time of acquisition. The amount of money which purchaser who is willing but not obligated to buy would pay owner who is willing but not obligated to sell, taking into consideration all uses to which the land is adapted and might in reason be applied. Arkansas State Highway Commission v. DeLaughter, 250 Ark. 990, 468 S.W.2d 242, 247.

Synonymous or identical terms are: actual cash value, Stiles v. Commissioner of Internal Revenue, C.C.A. Fla., 69 F.2d 951, 952;

- actual value, Appeals of Matson, 152 Pa.Super. 424, 33 A.2d 464, 465;

- cash market value, West Texas Hotel Co. v. City of El Paso, Tex.Civ.App., 83 S.W.2d 772, 775;

- fair cash market value, Housing Authority of Birmingham Dist. v. Title Guarantee Loan & Trust Co., 243 Ala. 157, 8 So.2d 835, 837;

- fair cash value, Commissioner of Corporations and Taxation v. Boston Edison Co., 310 Mass. 674, 39 N.E.2d 584, 593;

- market value, Fort Worth & D. N. Ry. Co. v. Sugg, Tex.Civ.App., 68 S.W.2d 570, 572; United States v. 3969.59 Acres of Land, D.C.Idaho, 56 F.Supp. 831, 837;

- reasonable market value, Housing Authority of Birmingham Dist. v. Title Guarantee Loan & Trust Co., 243 Ala. 157, 8 So.2d 835, 837;

- true cash value, Appeals of Matson, 152 Pa.Super. 424, 33 A.2d 464, 465.

See also fair value