A Property Tax Revolt Is Under Way
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Hey listeners, before we get into today's episode, we want to hear from you. What financial goals are you setting for yourself in 2025? Are you looking to level up your skills at work in search of a new job? Or maybe you want to save more money or start investing? Share your plans with us and you could be featured in an upcoming episode of your money briefing. Send us a voice note to ymb at wsj.com or 212-416-3413. And now on to the show. Here's your money briefing for Wednesday, November 13th. I'm J.R. Whelan for The Wall Street Journal. Property taxes in the U.S. rose 7 percent in 2023 compared to 2022, the largest increase in the past five years. Taxpayers have had enough.
There are people who are just today getting a tax bill that includes this huge run up in the value of their home that happened a couple of years ago. And they're seeing a 20 percent increase or whatever, and they're losing their mind a little bit. And so I think you'll definitely see more pressure on lawmakers from homeowners to slow the pace of these increases.
We'll talk to Wall Street Journal reporter Will Parker after the break.
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Last week, voters in eight states approved measures that will lower their property tax bill. Wall Street Journal reporter Will Parker joins me. Will, who pays property taxes and what do they typically fund?
Property owners pay property taxes. That's commercial property owners and also homeowners, people who own residential property. And those taxes fund all sorts of local government needs and services, often fund school districts, for example. They're one of the main revenue sources for counties and cities and towns all over the country.
How are the property taxes calculated?
So typically they're based on the assessed value of the home, which is something that the local assessment authority comes up with that is supposed to be tied to its real market value.
Give us an idea of some of the proposals that voters approved last week.
So what you've been seeing across the country is that in response to the huge surge in home values that we've seen over the last five years, basically unprecedented climate and home prices, is that means that more and more homeowners are seeing their assessment values for tax purposes rise right alongside it. So they're getting higher and higher tax bills. They're coming in all at once. And so that anger... at the pace and the climb in property tax bills has been made known to lawmakers by voters. And we've seen bills introduced at the state and local levels to make changes to property taxes. And also at the ballot, we had 10 states that considered some property tax-related measure last week.
In your story, you highlighted Georgia and Florida among a couple of states. What was significant there?
So Georgia decided that they would essentially cap how much the assessment on a person's home could rise at any given time. And that cap would be based on the inflation rate, which is typically a single-digit number, whereas the market value of a home in a really hot year could be a lot higher than that. So that would keep taxes lower for current homeowners than they would be if it was purely tied to the market value. Florida did an exemption that people receive off their property taxes that was designed so that it would increase more with inflation.
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