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For example, I would have thought new Rochelle would have less taxes then say bronxville or Scarsdale but in many cases there’s not a massive different. On a million $ house maybe your talking a few hundred less in NR then in Bronxville or Scars. Not to mention some million dollar homes in NR are 18K in taxes and others are 30k. Yes I understand each house is different but wow what a discrepancy. Where does one get a solid deal on taxes? It’s all over the map it’s just so odd too me. Also, who the heck pays 25k for 1 mil in NR? https://www.realtor.com/realestatean...4_M39232-16713
I’m not getting the decisions people make on the taxes and why there’s such huge changes within same towns.
I don’t know much about Westchester County taxes but I look into Fairfield County over state line in Connecticut much lower taxes than Westchester. You like it better than Westchester.
Stamford area is 40 min express to Grand Central, 15-20 mins to White Plains, NY and 16 mins to New Rochelle on 95 no traffic.
Stamford-North Stamford, Springdale, East Shippan, The Cove, Glenbrook, Downtown there some nice apartments and condos.
Darien
Greenwich
Trumbull—-closer to Meritt Parkway
Fairfield
Norwalk—-Rowayton, West Norwalk, East Norwalk, areas near Merrit Parkway
Westport
When I was doing my house hunt a few years ago, I had the same frustrations. The variables that I was able to narrow down the tax impacts:
School District. So, for example, in Rye there are two school districts, and each has its own tax rate. So you’ll see differences between houses of similar price that are in different school districts. But these differences do not typically result in huge differences for houses of the same price.
School Tax Collection and Reporting. While the district is already one variable, since the school districts have different tax rates themselves, but some school districts strangely do not show their taxes on city/town tax reporting, so you won’t see the impact the same in many realtor sites that source this information. So houses in Rye in one school district will have the school tax included in most realtor reports, but houses in the other school district will show taxes without the school tax. Since this is the biggest part of the property tax, I saw the same kind of thing that you are seeing in New Rochelle. I can’t say this is exactly what you are seeing, since I never shopped New Rochelle.
I don’t know much about Westchester County taxes but I look into Fairfield County over state line in Connecticut much lower taxes than Westchester. You like it better than Westchester.
Stamford area is 40 min express to Grand Central, 15-20 mins to White Plains, NY and 16 mins to New Rochelle on 95 no traffic.
Stamford-North Stamford, Springdale, East Shippan, The Cove, Glenbrook, Downtown there some nice apartments and condos.
Darien
Greenwich
Trumbull—-closer to Meritt Parkway
Fairfield
Norwalk—-Rowayton, West Norwalk, East Norwalk, areas near Merrit Parkway
Westport
Why would I like CT better then westChester? What makes you say that? I find CT to be a boring state with boring people. Greenwich, yeah right! Darien is ok but still a hard no. Norwalk is trash. Westport is beautiful but wayyyyy to suburban cookie cutter for me. CT is for a very different person then me.
It does help but also makes life that much more frustrating, across westChester the taxes are just insanely confusing too me. Any chance during your search did you uncover a town that seemed like a good deal? School district is not all that important too me yet I’m trying not to pay a premium based on school district. In 5 years that will play a role but I’ll move again for that.
Taxes are some %age of assessed value.
%age:
The %age is a combination of town + school.
The %age is lower in places where there's a larger commercial tax base (eg White Plains)
The %age may be lower in places where house prices are higher. 5X price of house does not use 5X times the amount of tax revenue (eg. school spots, garbage pickup). This may not be super helpful but if you eg. find a $500K house next to $5m houses, you are effectively freeriding off their taxes as you both pay the same rate but they pay 10X what you do.
assessed value:
Broadly related to house value but different towns have different "strategies" for keeping them in line.
Houses may be over-assessed or under-assessed. not everyone keeps on top of the grievance process.
What it all means in practice as you house hunt:
For every town, find the assessor web site to understand actual assessment of any specific house and the tax rate.
Houses right next to each other will likely be taxed at the same rate but may be assessed at different amounts.
If you are buying at a price below where it's assessed - you may be able to grieve the assessment down to what you paid and get the taxes lowered.
If you are buying at a price above where it's assessed - you may get a nasty surprise when assessment is brought in line with value.
Agree with Hartsdale Resident that the key is to determine how a town calculates the assessed value of a home.
The towns with the simplest calculations will just list the assessed value and you pay taxes off of that. E.g. if the taxes are $25k and the assessed value is $1mm, then the effective tax rate is 2.5%.
If you pay $800k for that house, then you can try to grieve the taxes down since you may be over assessed. If you pay $1.2mm then you are under assessed on your taxes.
I googled and New Rochelle taxes can be calculated via the calculations in this link.
The lowest tax rates are in Rye City (~1.6-1.7%), White Plains (~2%) and Armonk (~2%). Comparing towns isn't an apple to apples comparison, you might have a lower tax rate in Rye City but the house price will be higher. Another poster mentioned CT. Greenwich has a very low tax rate (under 1%) but the house prices are higher to offset that.
New Rochelle may have a similar tax rate to Scarsdale, but the house prices there for an equivalent house and property will likely be lower to factor in for the lower-rated school district.
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