Homeowners are paying more for property taxes. Nationwide, the average property tax bill was $3,498 in 2018, up 3 percent compared to a year ago, ATTOM Data Solutions, a real estate data firm, reports in a new analysis. The effective tax rate was 1.16 percent in 2018 (which is the average annual property tax).
New Jersey, Illinois, Texas, Vermont, and Connecticut had the highest effective tax rates in the country in 2018, the analysis showed.
“Property taxes levied on homeowners rose again in 2018 across most of the country,” says Todd Teta, chief product officer for ATTOM Data Solutions. “While many states across the country have imposed caps on how much taxes can go up, which probably contributed to a slower increase in 2018 versus 2017. There are still many factors at play that can contribute to local property tax hikes, and without major changes in the way a community runs public services, tax rates must rise to pay for them.”
Property taxes rose faster than the national average in 58 percent of the markets tracked in the study. Of the 219 metro areas analyzed, 120—or 55 percent—posted an increase in average property taxes above the national average of 3 percent. Some of those metro areas included Los Angeles (5 percent increase); Dallas-Fort Worth (8 percent increase); Washington, D.C. (4 percent increase); Atlanta (7 percent increase); and San Francisco (7 percent increase).
ATTOM Data Solutions’ analysis covered more than 87 million U.S. single-family homes. It showed property taxes levied on single-family homes in 2018 totaled $304.6 billion, up 4 percent from 2017. Researchers analyzed property tax data collected from county tax assessor offices nationwide at the state, metro, and county levels, along with estimated market values of single-family homes calculated using an automated valuation model.
Highest Property Taxes
The states with the highest effective property tax rates in 2018 were:
- New Jersey: 2.25%
- Illinois: 2.22%
- Texas: 2.18%
- Vermont: 2.16%
- Connecticut: 2.02%
- New Hampshire: 1.99%
- New York: 1.86%
- Pennsylvania: 1.79%
- Ohio: 1.69%
- Wisconsin: 1.58%
By metro area, those with the highest effective property tax rates (among those with populations of at least 200,000) were in Binghamton, N.Y. (3.19 percent); Syracuse, N.Y. (2.89 percent); Rochester, N.Y. (2.88 percent); Rockford, Ill. (2.83 percent); and Atlantic City, N.J. (2.74 percent).
Lowest Property Taxes
Meanwhile, the following states had the lowest effective property tax rates in the country:
- Hawaii: 0.37%
- Alabama: 0.48%
- Colorado: 0.51%
- Nevada: 0.57%
- Utah: 0.57%
- West Virginia: 0.58%
- Delaware: 0.61%
- Arizona: 0.64%
- Tennessee: 0.65%
- Wyoming: 0.66%
By metro area, the lowest effective property tax rates in 2018 were in Laredo, Texas (0.35 percent); Honolulu (0.36 percent); Montgomery, Ala. (0.37 percent); Tuscaloosa, Ala. (0.39 percent); and Colorado Springs, Colo. (0.42 percent).
Source: ATTOM Data Solutions
