Article- 10 Top US Counties for highest property taxes

[roadman65]

http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2015/04/7_of_the_10_counties_in_america_with_the_highest_property_taxes_are_in_nj_study_says.html
Article stating that New Jersey has the most counties in the top ten of being the highest with property taxes in nation.

[Zeffy]

http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2015/04/7_of_the_10_counties_in_america_with_the_highest_property_taxes_are_in_nj_study_says.html
Article stating that New Jersey has the most counties in the top ten of being the highest with property taxes in nation.

Our taxes are ridiculous, but the amazing schools, beautiful scenery, and the location between Philadelphia and New York City are all good reasons to be here. If the taxes were lowered, we could probably entice our businesses to stay in this state too...

[NE2]

It's stupid to compare bare dollar figures.

[kkt]

Sure, but if they adjusted for wages and cost of living and other sources of tax it would be too much like work, instead of clickbait.

[yanksfan6129]

I read somewhere else that counties in upstate New York tend to have the highest property tax rate as the percentage of the assessed value of the homes. I believe Monroe County (Rochester) has the highest.

[empirestate]

Well, here I am buying a house that is walking distance to the #1 county on the list. And though I'm actually in the neighboring county, which isn't in the top 10, my tax bill actually will be comparable to Westchester's, in part because the house is in a "special district", which is an additional taxing authority under NYS municipal structure.

SIDE RANT: I never understood the push for village dissolution that ran across NYS in recent years. People say they want to escape the encumbrance of an additional municipal layer that a village government represents, but when you disincorporate the village you have to replace it with these "special districts" to provide the former village services–water, sidewalks, street lighting, etc.–or else pass the costs on to other taxpayers in the town who live outside of the village area.

Special districts are all over the place in downstate counties, and they can be layered and nested several deep. And while they have power to levy additional taxes, they have far less transparency as to how the taxes are assessed and who pays for what services, exactly. The state has begun some investigations into these districts lately because of this, and given all the confusion I don't understand why village residents have been so eager to abandon that structure in favor of this much more complex and less predictable one that only amplifies the conditions that they object to under village government.

[NJRoadfan]

Living in #7, its amazing how few services we actually get. But the taxes are "cheap" by NJ standards, actually lowest in the county. Our taxes don't include garbage pickup (have to pay for private carting) and the fire and EMS department is volunteer. The municipal portion of the bill is tiny though and really only pays for the police and very basic services. The bulk goes towards schools followed by the county.

[empirestate]

Yesterday I spent $10 to visit a county park in #1.


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[Pete from Boston]

Living in #7, its amazing how few services we actually get. But the taxes are "cheap" by NJ standards, actually lowest in the county. Our taxes don't include garbage pickup (have to pay for private carting) and the fire and EMS department is volunteer. The municipal portion of the bill is tiny though and really only pays for the police and very basic services. The bulk goes towards schools followed by the county.

When I owned property in a county on this list, the taxes were very high, but there were also things like twice weekly trash collection, weekly recycling collection, free collection of household hazardous wastes, re-streetscaping in every few years–all kinds of little bells and whistles of public amenities that I do not see for free where I live now.   

People seemed upset at the tax rates, but no one ever said, "Gee, we have an awful cushy set of public services here."  It had become sort of one big luxury condo where everyone demanded pretty hedges and balked at the high fees.

[empirestate]

People seemed upset at the tax rates, but no one ever said, "Gee, we have an awful cushy set of public services here."  It had become sort of one big luxury condo where everyone demanded pretty hedges and balked at the high fees.

That's kinda what I was getting at with my previous post. I don't really think twice about the high taxation in NYC (I don't own property here, but we all pay a general income tax) because the city provides so many services. (It doesn't always provide them well or efficiently–they spread salt in the parks by either jiggling a shovel by hand, or driving an entire spreader truck through the park, no middle ground–but that's another story.)

But when you visit the county with the nation's highest property taxes, and then you still have to pay a fee to use a county service like a park, that's when the head-scratching begins for me.

[Scott5114]

Living in #7, its amazing how few services we actually get. But the taxes are "cheap" by NJ standards, actually lowest in the county. Our taxes don't include garbage pickup (have to pay for private carting) and the fire and EMS department is volunteer. The municipal portion of the bill is tiny though and really only pays for the police and very basic services. The bulk goes towards schools followed by the county.

When I owned property in a county on this list, the taxes were very high, but there were also things like twice weekly trash collection, weekly recycling collection, free collection of household hazardous wastes, re-streetscaping in every few years–all kinds of little bells and whistles of public amenities that I do not see for free where I live now.   

People seemed upset at the tax rates, but no one ever said, "Gee, we have an awful cushy set of public services here."  It had become sort of one big luxury condo where everyone demanded pretty hedges and balked at the high fees.

Norman started single-stream recycling a couple of years ago. We didn't see any rate hike or tax for it, because I believe the company we have the recycling contracted out to sorts the waste and sells it to more specialized recyclers (the aluminum to a dedicated aluminum recycling plant, plastics to plastic recyclers, etc).

[Pete from Boston]

People seemed upset at the tax rates, but no one ever said, "Gee, we have an awful cushy set of public services here."  It had become sort of one big luxury condo where everyone demanded pretty hedges and balked at the high fees.

That's kinda what I was getting at with my previous post. I don't really think twice about the high taxation in NYC (I don't own property here, but we all pay a general income tax) because the city provides so many services. (It doesn't always provide them well or efficiently–they spread salt in the parks by either jiggling a shovel by hand, or driving an entire spreader truck through the park, no middle ground–but that's another story.)

But when you visit the county with the nation's highest property taxes, and then you still have to pay a fee to use a county service like a park, that's when the head-scratching begins for me.

You find that everywhere, because parks are in the basement of public priorities.

[Duke87]

This is basically just a list of 10 counties with the highest median single family home prices. So of course they're all counties home to suburbs of New York City.

What's interesting is how Fairfield County, CT - known for having some pricey homes owned by people with a lot of money - does not make the top 10 here. This is most likely because Connecticut, unlike New York and New Jersey, does not have county government. So everyone who owns a home there only has one property tax bill (municipal) rather than two (municipal and county). Meanwhile Connecticut also assesses property taxes on cars, which will easily add another few hundred dollars per vehicle to your property tax bill that I assume is not accounted for here.

[empirestate]

This is basically just a list of 10 counties with the highest median single family home prices. So of course they're all counties home to suburbs of New York City.

That's only part of the story, though. I'm currently buying a home at a perfectly reasonable price, but I'll still have a 5-figure tax bill.


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