The proposed lower $8.99 tax levy rate does not guarantee that property tax bills will decrease, but it does lessen any potential increase in taxes due to rising fair market value of your property. Please continue reading for additional details and some examples.
As noted in the answer above, the fair market value of the property, determined annually by the state Department of Revenue, affects school property taxes. Using the five-year average from the answer above as a reference, we can project a range of possible outcomes of a lower $8.99 levy rate on individual tax bills.
The current $9.19 levy rate equates to $919 in property taxes per $100,000 of fair market property value. The Board of Education referendum plan to lower the levy rate to $8.99 would mean a drop of $20 on your tax bill for every $100,000 of fair market property value. This scenario is based on a 0% increase in the fair market value from 2020 to 2021. We can use that as the lower point of our range of possible outcomes.
If we instead base a scenario on Howard and Suamico’s five-year fair market value average annual increase of 5.88%, that would mean a levy rate drop from $9.19 to $8.99 would change a potential school property tax impact from an increase of $54.03 per $100,000 of property value (for a $9.19 rate) to an increase of $32.86 per $100,000 of property value (for an $8.99 rate). In this example, the new, lower $8.99 levy rate doesn’t lower your property taxes, but it does lessen the increase in taxes due to rising fair market value of your property.
If we look at a range of possible fair market value increases from 0% to the five-year average of 5.88%, we can project a property tax bill impact somewhere between a $20 decrease and a $32.86 increase for each $100,000 of property value for individual property owners if the referendum questions are approved.
If the fair market value increase should exceed the five-year average, the projected $32.86 increase could be slightly higher. Similarly, if the fair market value of Howard and Suamico properties should decrease this year (although an unlikely scenario), the $20 property tax decrease would also be slightly larger.