Tax Foundation Looks at Effective Property Tax Rates

The real estate tax figures released by the Tax Foundation this week are from 2014, but that’s the most recent data available.

Presented, along with other information is the effective tax rate for each state.

“This is the average amount of residential property tax actually paid, expressed as a percentage of home value,” the organization explains.

Here’s the summary, which Illinois made:

“New Jersey has the highest effective rate at 2.11 percent and is followed closely by New Hampshire (1.99 percent) and Illinois (1.98 percent).

“On the other end of the spectrum, Hawaii has the lowest effective rate at 0.28 percent, and is followed closely by Alabama (0.40 percent), Louisiana (0.50 percent), and Wyoming (0.51 percent).”

Of course, because the effective tax rate is so low in Chicago, the 1.98% calculated for Illinois is far below what it is outside of Cook County.

Figure out your own.

Divide your tax bill by what you could sell your home for.

Note that the average homeowner in Illinois paid about $2,000 in 2014.


Comments

Tax Foundation Looks at Effective Property Tax Rates — 19 Comments

  1. Woodstock homeowners would be overjoyed if our tax rate were cut in half to match the alleged 1.98% of fair market value tax rate in Illinois.

    Paying more than 4% actual tax rate on full fair market value of homes, Wooodstock homeowners are understandably perplexed at Chicago Punlic Schools ‘funding quandary’.

    If CPS raised their property tax rates 2 percentage points, to match that of Woodstock, they could resolve their budget deficit.

    Woodstock school board should be happy to explain to Chicago administrators why property tax rates above 4% are of no concern to a school board.

  2. Where is a jetliner when you need one? Tic, tock, tic, tock…

  3. Keep in mind that New Hampshire has no income tax or sales tax though.

    You pay 4.95 percent income tax in Illinois, and the sales tax is 6.25 plus local sales taxes.

    Illinois usually ranks first or second in total tax burden.

    And yet, we have one of the worst, if not the worst, budget situations in the country!

  4. Probably the first and last time we will make the top three of anything.

  5. Go ahead, move to Hawaii – you too can pay the highest sales taxes in the country.

    There is a lot of attention paid to property taxes in this County but it is the total tax burden in this state that causes people / businesses to leave.

    Is the total amount of tax too high?

    As far as I am concerned the answer is yes relative to the services we receive and the quality of the public education product.

    The total tax burden is the RESULT OF TOO MUCH PUBLIC SECTOR SPENDING!

    There is a move in this County to cut property taxes by 10 % and my response is: So what?

    As evidenced by the Soda tax in Cook County, government bodies will simply raise other taxes.

    There is already a move gaining steam in Springfield to raise gasoline taxes!

    Until we eliminate the Constitutionally guaranteed public sector pensions AND Prevailing wage laws plus wasteful public sector spending such as ESL and Roundabouts, stop the transfer of earned income to other countries in the form of remittances, and a litany of other wasteful spending items, the downward economic spiral will continue!

    Further to the Hawaii comment, based on another map provided by the Tax Foundation (donations to them are welcomed), purchasing power in Hawaii is the lowest in the nation.

    Comparable purchasing power of one hundred dollars:

    Illinois = $100.30 Rank is 36.

    Hawaii = $ 84.18 – rank is 50.

    Wisconsin = $107.41 – rank is 20.

    Indiana = $110.25 – rank is 16.

    Iowa = $110.74 – rank is 11.

    Mississippi, Alabama and Arkansas are 1, 2, 3.

    Those of you who are considering a move to Florida, they rank at 35 and Texas is 27.

    To repeat, businesses are leaving this state because of the FUTURE burden of Constitutionally guaranteed pensions and the continued ‘bending over’ by government bodies to public sector union demands.

  6. This analysis falsely diminishes the magnitude of destruction caused by property tax rates which are off-the-charts high relative to every other State…and in this county which are off-the-charts high relative to Illinois.

    1. People can choose not to buy soda, and avoid that tax.

    2. The average home price is perhaps 2000x the average annual household expenditure on soda.

    3. Whether owners or renters, every resident of this County must pay off-the-charts higher percentages of household income relative to the rest of the State and Country, to property taxes for social services provided all over America at half or less the cost.

    4. Our local economy suffers as what in normal economies would be discretionary hpusehold income is diverted to pay property taxes.

    5. At a 4.2% property tax rate, Woodstock homes lag Chicago homes’ normal inflationary appreciation.
    Every year Woodstock homes lose value due to property tax rate capitalization.

    Home equity poverty profoundly limits a family’s 20 year economic choices.

  7. To repeat, the issue is the spending. The source of the taxes to pay for the spending is secondary.

    Go ahead and lower property taxes.

    How will the spending then be supported?

    Higher income tax?

    More gambling with the social consequences?

    The way to lower property taxes AND end up lowering the total TAX BITE is to lower the spending as Susan has described many times relative to the Schools.

    We need to quit subsidizing the Chicago schools.

  8. Susan, your logic falls on deaf Democrat ears.

    Here’s the real situation: Primarily White collar county property taxpayers, must subsidize the primarily minority quagmires.

    All the mismanagement, crony politics, scams, kick-backs, etc., of Chicago and its thoroughly rotten ‘publik skool sistum’ will never get any better — only worse, so dig deep lady; YOU MUST PAY UP.

    ‘Justice’, fairness, propriety, etc., are all out the window. Please smell the coffee.

    Solution: Move out!

  9. Cautious Voter,

    One does not need to look at Cook County/soda tax for “cut taxes here, but raise taxes there” mentality.

    City of Woodstock cut property taxes before the election, and now they just passed the 1% sales tax, trading $800,000 in property tax revenue for and estimated $2.3 MILLION in sales taxes.

  10. City of Woodstock asks for a 12 year TIF extension.

    This is now costing taxpayers $700,000 annually, which would otherwise go to schools.

    Unless D200 objects, they will get 12 more years of this tax-rate cap evasion mechanism (to spend on outdoor decking for restaurants on the square, and unnecessary roundabouts for example).

    D200 school board will sell out taxpayers (I predict based upon past performance) for some cheap payoff such as $50-$100k from TIF, which is not legal unless ALL taxing bodies get prorata TIF payola shares, but nobody ever checks or prosecutes such collusion).

  11. The TIF money would be about the same as the highly publicized 1% tax cut.

  12. Wow thats is way off of my reality: I pay %2.98. Thank you Mchenry county!

  13. Rate in McHenry is closer to 3% and higher in more mismanaged School district areas.

    Not noted is Illinois also has one of the highest Sales tax and user tax rates vs those closest to us on the top 10 list.

    Angel gets her 100k pension with 3% COLA either way so is a fan of us schmucks paying up.

  14. Thank you Leeeeeeey for making my point.

    We MUST insist the Schools, Townships, Cities / Villages / Towns, Fire Districts, Park Districts, the County and its Conservation District plus all the other units of government reduce their spending by ten percent.

    Forget about just reducing my property tax because the government bodies will simply get their money some other way.

    Note that this year every public sector union employee received a wage increase – I did not.

    I do not believe anyone living off a private sector pension got an increase in their pension payment either.

  15. The name Angel is of Spanish origin and is generally considered a boy’s name, although this name could be just as beautiful for a baby girl.

    The name Angel was ranked number 42 on the Social Security Administration’s top baby name list for boys.

    Angel comes from the medieval Latin masculine name Angelus which was derived from the name of the heavenly creature (itself derived from the Greek word αγγελος (angelos) meaning “messenger”).

    It has never been very common in the English-speaking world, where it is sometimes used as a feminine name in modern times.

    Angel is ranked as the 427th most popular given name in the United States with an estimated population of 141,072.

    This name is in the top percentile, this means that nearly 0% of all the first names are more popular.

    There are 44.24 people named ANGEL for every 100,000 Americans.

    Based on the analysis of 100 years worth of data from the Social Security Administration’s (SSA) Baby Names database, the estimated population of people named Angel is 285,071

    There are 9,016 last names associated with the first name Angel.

    Please praise this prodigious research. Clap, clap, clap, clap! Thank you! Tic, tock, tic, tock…

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