Tennessee Property Taxes (Oak Ridge: new home, schools, live in)

[hiknapster]

Thanks for the explanation, MB. I FINALLY understand taxes. Great explanation.

[GrannyLois]

Good reality check, JMT. Thanks!

[KittyBurglar]

Originally Posted by tismekll

Sorry but I have to disagree with this statement. Taxing food hurts the poor. Everyone has to eat.

Taxing food or taxing anything hurts everybody being taxed, rich or poor.

[KittyBurglar]

Originally Posted by mbmouse

No, it is based on the assessed value, not appraised value. Here is an example:
To calculate the tax on your property, assume you have a house with an APPRAISED VALUE of $100,000. The ASSESSED VALUE is $25,000 (25% of $100,000), and the TAX RATE has been set by your county commission at $2.00 per hundred of assessed value. In this case, Washington County. To figure the tax simply multiply the assessed value ($25,000) by the tax rate ($2.00 per hundred dollars assessed). Which is $500.00 a year in property taxes.
This is an example of one Counties tax, some cities add there own tax so this can up to double inside a city limits.
According to the list you can't get to the cheapest county tax in TN is
Sevier County at $1.34 of assessed value and the most expensive county is Shelby County at $4.09 of assessed value.
The cheapest County and City tax combined (If you need to live in a city) is
Pigeon Forge in Sevier County at a total of $1.4642
and the most expensive property tax is Memphis in Shelby County at a total of $7.4732

I am really glad you could not see that page. I don't mean in a bad way but it made me look really close at all the different tax rates across TN. I have to say I was surprised to do that comparison and see that Sevier County is the cheapest property taxes, I had been told by many, including Real Estate professionals that Sever county taxes were expensive. I guess that is the break you get for having to deal with all the tourist traffic if you live there? hahahahaha
And I really expected Williamson County with Brentwood which has one of the highest property values to to the highest tax.
So thank you for asking that specific question.

And thank you for looking at it and interpreting it for me.

[KittyBurglar]

Originally Posted by JMT

Poor people get groceries for free. Food stamps. The children of poor people get free meals at school.

No one has a "right" to pre-packaged foods. The poor people in Tennessee are not any more malnourished or underfed than are the poor people of Florida or Georgia, where most grocery items are not taxed. The truly poor already get free food no matter where they live.

There was a recent news report setting forth states with the highest rates of obesity, or else it ranked all states, I've forgotten. Whichever it was, I recall that TN had one of the highest rated levels of obese citizens. Therefore, I conclude that the poor in TN are getting more than enough to eat, since the poor tend toward obesity more than the wealthy do.

[hiknapster]

The poor tend to eat inexpensive food such as pasta, beans, rice, bread, etc.

[mbmouse]

I think it is the fact that they still sell 5 gallon buckets of lard in some local grocery stores so people (of ALL financial statuses) can fry every thing the eat just like mamaw used too????
I have found it absolutely amazing the amount of fried food that is consumed around here.

[Lutz Lady]

I heard on the radio that the Governor of TN is looking into repealing the tax on food. Has anyone heard anything about this??

[JMT]

Originally Posted by Lutz Lady

I heard on the radio that the Governor of TN is looking into repealing the tax on food. Has anyone heard anything about this??

Yeah I've heard that. The question is what foods would not be taxed? What defines basic food? If milk isn't taxed, what about Coke? If bread isn't taxed, how about doughnuts?

But since the governor is talking about increasing the gas tax because a portion of the gas tax is currently paying for other state services that are currently under-funded, I can't imagine that the sales tax on food would be cut unless another tax were increased.

[KittyBurglar]

Originally Posted by hiknapster

The poor tend to eat inexpensive food such as pasta, beans, rice, bread, etc.

The poor people I see shopping have their carts loaded with junk food, soda and prepared foods. If they can afford that, they can afford a couple of whole chickens, which are very cheap, and some fresh fruits and vegetables. Bags of apples, carrots, broccoli, cabbage, squash and several others are all very cheap.