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False. The low property taxes are only in the unincorporated areas of the State and those consist of 52% of the land area of Maine.
52% of the state is Unincorporated Townships, which do have extremely low taxes.
About 10% of the state is urban with high taxes.
The remaining 38% is still small rural-ish towns with very low taxes [as compared to the other 49 states.
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... In that 52% very few people live (around 10% if I recall correctly) and have your property tax situation. The rest of the population deals with a much higher tax rate
I have not seen nor heard of anything remotely to confirm your statement.
I do know people living in each adjoining town near me, all incorporated towns, and all with mil-rates that are still much lower than Portland.
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... The rest of the rural areas deals with low wages, average home prices, and high overall taxes (compared to the services rendered.)
Taxes may seem 'high' compared to services, that is pretty subjective. Mil-rate to mil-rate, they tend to run much lower than anywhere else.
We routinely see people moving to Maine who find homes for 1/2 of what their previous homes were valued at.
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... Which is exactly what you do all the time when the issue of taxes in Maine come up. You are in the HUGE minority when it comes to taxes, yet you always throw out your unique situation in a manner that comes across as a blanket statement about the taxes for the entire state.
Because people here still seem to want to insist that paying less is somehow more. Less is less, more is more. I do not see the confusion.
Yes, property taxes are a killer--and despite our supposed "democracy," government officials here couldn't care less that they are taxing retirees right out of their paid-for-homes.
I agree.
We have previously owned homes on the East coast and the West coast, where my pension by itself would barely cover the property taxes [between a house and vehicles]. One state I recall where my annual pension is less than what our property taxes were.
People can say that taxes should never be a consideration. But, taxes form the basis of your cost-of-living.
To live anywhere you must be able to afford your cost-of-living. You may be able to easily control how much you spend on clothes, eating out, or your electric bill. But it is hard to effect how much you pay for your taxes on your house each year.
Which is why I feel it is very important an issue for retirees.
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... Similarly, if anyone in the family loses their job, they'll still need to come up with $10,000 a year (or more) in property taxes for the average home on less than an acre of land.
I agree.
Going from a $10k tax bill to a $1k tax bill has a huge effect on your cost-of-living.
It certainly had a big effect on our personal budget.
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.. When my Dad retired here in southeast NH in the mid-1980s, he could survive even without a pension by renting out a small garage that was converted into a cottage, and renting it out for 8 weeks in the summer. That paid his property taxes for the year, and his Social Security paid the rest of his minimal living expenses (although he watched every penny and had absolutely NO luxuries, vacations, or unnecessary spending).
Currently, the GROSS rent from that little cottage would be less than 25% of the property tax--when you add in the costs of utilities and required payments to rent it, it's about 10%. And the cost of living here has skyrocketed, also, with everything costing more as the Fed devalues the dollar, and Big Business maximizing profits on the workers' backs.
We are currently locked into stressful and miserable 80-hour a week jobs, and unable to sell our house because of the housing crash. We lose ground every year, and I fear our chance of moving to a low-tax and low-cost-of-living area, where we can LIVE life instead of merely surviving it, is slipping away.
I wish you luck.
I see the spot your in. I do understand. I have friends who are likewise in the same spot.
When I first retired, I saw the math of where we were living and I knew it was not going to work. So I got going. That was before the housing crash. Today, I have no idea how a person could make it work while stuck in a high cost area.
We are in the same situation as forest beekeeper. While Nebraska made the list of tax hells (gosh, I hope that means that fewer people will come here!) we have not found it to be a 'tax hell' at all.
We live very rurally, and our 60 acres, barns, farmhouse, and outbuildings still cost us the same in taxes as did our SC 'mini-ranch house' on 1/3 of an acre. There was no exemption for a disabled person in SC - apparently even if you are crippled you still have to pay the same taxes, their only exemption is the homesteading one for blind or over 65. Nebraska has an exemption for disabled people.
Sales tax is 7% here; 1% less than where we were in SC, and they were pushing another LOST (local option sales tax) when we were leaving to take it up to 10%. However, if we buy something in Nebraska that we are going to use on our farm or home (not food), the minute it crosses outside of any Nebraska town limit, it is not subject to sales tax - which means that we buy all of our furnishings without paying sales tax. It's a little-known odd little state law that my furniture dealer keyed us in on.
As for Nebraska's income tax, DH's SS is not counted as income because of his disablity, and neither is his disabled retirement income from SC. The only income taxes we had to pay were on my job here (minimal pay and no benefits). Even when we sold the place in SC, we didn't make enough after paying off the mortgage, taxes, etc to have it considered as "taxable income" from either state.
It's all in how much you actually have; I knew people who used their SS to pay their greens fees at their golf resorts; those types of folks would probably be impacted far more than we are. Nebraska was and is a far better tax deal for us than SC. Not that we really CARED - it was worth it to get out to a place where we could finally enjoy life and living!
Another cost of living quirk is that I can buy a whole half of a cow or a whole hog for just under a dollar a pound - and have it cut to order and wrapped for that price. Local honey is $8 a gallon. South Dakota wheat, flour, and other grains are cheap - $14 to $18, depending on grain and type - by the 50 lb sack. We and our neighbors grow, can, and trade vegetables, and we have our own eggs and chickens. We buy everything in bulk, and eat very well for far less than folks who live near several grocery stores.
We filled our propane tank out back for $500 last year, but we also have a woodstove and get our wood from everywhere - we have over 10 cords in the shed/yard right now. People give it away, or even sometimes pay us to take it.
Nebraska = bad. Don't come here. Really. You'll hate it. 9 months of winter, then the tornadoes, hail, a constant wind that blows winter summer spring and fall, everything is too far away, there's no amenities, no nightlife, its boring and awful. And the reports all say that the taxes are hell. Believe them. Really. Don't come.
To SCGranny: You have found a solution that works well for you, and that is wonderful. However, you needn't lose any sleep over people flocking to Nebraska in droves!
As far as the tax situation and the article go, I think you raise an interesting point, namely that if people don't have very much income they don't get hit by the bad tax situations that are detailed in the article. The majority of states do not count Social Security benefits for state income taxation - even California doesn't. And sometimes retirees do not have enough income outside of Social Security to even meet the threshhold for paying any state income tax. Most states exempt food from sales taxes, and if people do not have much income they will not be buying great volumes of stuff to pay sales tax on.
After all, the article comes from Kiplinger, which is an investment advice type organization. The people who read Kiplinger are, for the most part, well-off. For them, all the business about the 10 worst tax states is probably valid.
SCGranny: Loved your post and the end point brought a good chuckle! You accurately demonstrate that the gross data doesn't capture what living in a specific area is all about.
Everyone should drive across your state at least once when the crops are in full growth, it is an amazingly beautiful sight. The "endless waves of grain" vista is something I recommend anyone to experience as part of seeing the US.
We retired to KY from So. CA - we do get a $41,400 deduction from our state tax on our pension - this is less than 1/3 of our income but it does help. Social Security income is taxed but that is an insignificant amount for us. Property taxes are not bad here and the total cost of living is much less than in California.
No Nebraska waves of grain for me - I have Celiac disease and must remain gluten free
Thanks!
The grain is the eastern side... and it's mostly corn.
I live in the Sandhills region... hills and hills and still more hills of prairie grass, covered in grass-fed, gluten-free beef!
Thanks!
The grain is the eastern side... and it's mostly corn.
I live in the Sandhills region... hills and hills and still more hills of prairie grass, covered in grass-fed, gluten-free beef!
LOL - good! I'm sure Nebraska is gorgeous! Corn is good as is beef! We have lots of cows and corn here in KY too and of course beautiful horses and horse farms. We are very hilly too with lots of forests, lakes, waterfalls, streams, rivers, marinas, etc. too....and of course there are fields of tobacco and old tobacco barns where the tobacco dries - not healthy but quaint.
We do pay $700 a year for city tax in our small city but get lots of services in return including twice a week trash pick-up and pristine maintenance of green spaces and city streets, quick snow removal (the few times we have snow), our own police and fire dept., etc.
"Some states offer attractive tax benefits for retirees. Then there are these ten tax hells, which have earned a place on our "do not live here for your second act" list either because of higher-than-average taxes across the board or because of policies that don't exempt much retirement income from state taxation."
things must be pretty good for retirees' in terms of paying taxes, if the worst state in the list simply doesn't offer any special breaks.
I completely disagree - there are counties/cities in California and other states that pay 10% sales tax - we pay 6% - over time, that makes a big difference. When we consider all the taxes we pay both federal and state, we are paying over 30% of our income to taxes...not great for this retiree.
We lived in California for most of our lives - you are taxed at every turn there - it was recently named (I believe by Forbes) as the least tax friendly state for retirees.
Where you live does certainly make a difference in how much of your money you get to keep. Things, in general, are not great for many retirees - many are living on very little and doing without medication and other things they need. The less money you have to give to the government, the more you get to keep for yourself....that is very important to some of us.
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- and have it cut to order and wrapped for that price. Local honey is $8 a gallon. South Dakota wheat, flour, and other grains are cheap - $14 to $18, depending on grain and type - by the 50 lb sack. We and our neighbors grow, can, and trade vegetables, and we have our own eggs and chickens. We buy everything in bulk, and eat very well for far less than folks who live near several grocery stores. 
hail, a constant wind that blows winter summer spring and fall, everything is too far away, there's no amenities, no nightlife, its boring and awful. And the reports all say that the taxes are hell. Believe them. Really. Don't come. 
