Something Is Seriously Wrong Here

So a person buys some property. They then do renovations to the property. They finish the renovations, which have improved the property's value. Yet the property tax people give this person a reduction and a refund?

Apparently this just happened in San Mateo county with Larry Ellison. He bought some property. He turned it into a replica of a 16th Century Japanese palace. Then, when it was completed, he had his attorney go to the tax appeals board for the county and seek a reduction because it is "functionally obsolete". So the tax appeals board granted an approximate 60% reduction in the value of the property from $166.3 million (which was low to begin with it seems) to $64.7 million.

Of course, I would like to know how a piece of property which has been renovated in the last three years can be functionally obsolete when it has the following: an approximate 8,000-square-foot main house a guest home, three cottages, a gymnasium, a 5-acre man-made lake, two waterfalls, two bridges; Hundreds of mature cherry, maple and other trees were planted among nearly 1,000 redwoods, pines and oaks.

Apparently, because he built such a unique home, he is now claiming that no one could possibly want to buy it on the market. Therefore, because he chose to act this way, he should reap the benefit.

Does this sound right to anyone else? I suppose $25 billion isn't enough of a cushion for this guy.