Not surprisingly the eight Illinois counties with the highest property tax rates are in the northeastern sector of the state. DeKalb County is ranked 7th highest by median property taxes, and 4th highest by median tax as percentage of home value.
Of the eight counties with the highest median property taxes DeKalb County has the highest tax percent of home value. It has the lowest median home value of the eight.
| COUNTY | MEDIAN HOME VALUE | TAX PERCENT OF HOME VALUE | MEDIAN PROPERTY TAX | PROPERTY TAX ON $250,000 HOME | MEDIAN HOUSEHOLD INCOME |
| DeKalb | $192,300 | 2.22% | $4,269 | $5,550 | $54,002 |
| Lake | $287,300 | 2.19% | $6,292 | $5,475 | $78,948 |
| Kendall | $248,300 | 2.16% | $5,363 | $5,400 | $79,897 |
| McHenry | $249,700 | 2.09% | $5,219 | $5,225 | $76,482 |
| Kane | $245,000 | 2.09% | $5,121 | $5,225 | $67,767 |
| Will | $240,500 | 2.05% | $4,930 | $5,125 | $75,906 |
| DuPage | $316,900 | 1.71% | $5,419 | $4,275 | $76,581 |
| Cook | $265,800 | 1.38% | $3,668 | $3,450 | $53,942 |
| SOURCES: US Census Bureau, Illinois Dept. of Revenue, The Tax Foundation | |||||
In most paid studies that support planning policies in DeKalb County a $250,000 home is a preferred target for growth. A $250,000 home is even more desired as property values have declined. As for new growth a new construction single family detached home would be difficult to build for less than $250,000 even with lot prices that are 1/3 of what they were in 2008.
Declining property values are not exclusive to DeKalb County by any means. All of the eight counties with the highest median property taxes share this problem.
Qualified buyers of a $250,000 home comparison shop. Schools, parks and public amenities are important as is commuting time. The amount required to pay in ongoing annual property taxes is another. DeKalb County ranks highest of the eight in that category.
An owner of a $250,000 home in Kane County would pay $300 per year less in property taxes than in DeKalb County. A Cook County commuter working in DeKalb County could pay $2,000 less for a $250,000 home.
The high median property taxes issue may well stop any suburban sprawl from encroaching on DeKalb County. But it also suffers the move-up buyer already living in the county.
The typical median household income family living in a median $192,000 home already pays eight percent of their income for property taxes. To move up to a $250,000 home would increase that rate to 10%.
DeKalb and Cook counties share the lowest median household income rankings with the elite eight.
Better jobs or less taxes?
Filed under: The other side of the property tax levy coin.
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7 Comments
Taxes are about as popular as cancer. It is obvious that people like services, just no one wants to pay for them. Should Illinois switch to funding based on an income tax? It has been proposed but hasn’t gone anywhere. Currently wealthy communities have much better funding than depressed areas. Will the push to privatize our schools, the military, prisons, etc. serve us better or just create corruption for private profit? Wall Street is onboard with these schemes and lobbying for this change. So far private military contractors and prisons haven’t worked out so well.
At least a cancer patient has a chance for remission.
Dekalb County Total Assets (2012) – $171,144,037
City of Dekalb Total Assets (2012) – $228,689,944
Dekalb School District 428 Total Assets (2012) – $216,298,720
Dekalb Park District Total Assets (2012) – $19,975,539
These figures seem very low! PROPERTY TAX ON $250,000 HOME- $5550.00…My house is worth about $90K less than that an my taxes are over $6300.00.
Good point Mark. The data I used in the table is from government sources that are usually dated a couple of years. These are also county not city stats. Debt is another factor. DeKalb is straddled with the $110 million debt bonds for school construction without the new construction EAV projections used to sell the referendum.
I hope you are appealing your tax assessment.
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DeKalb county faces some major obstacles. DeKalb has become a destination for poor folks. People that can not contribute much in the way of income tax, sales tax, and property taxes. These people may need services more than the general population. We also have a lot of tax exempt property in DeKalb County such as NIU. Finally, we are very reliant on taxing residential property for our tax levy. Lake County only has 1/3 of its levy as residential and DeKalb county relies on it for 2/3 of our tax levy. We desperately need new commercial and industrial growth in our county.