CHARDON, Ohio — Property owners in select counties across Northeast Ohio will notice an increase in their 2023 property taxes, thanks to robust and record-breaking real estate sales.
County appraisers in Ashland, Ashtabula, Geauga, Richland, Summit, and Wayne counties are wrapping up their required sexennial and triennial property reappraisals and are seeing an average of more than 30% increases in residential property values.
However, as Geauga County Auditor Chuck Walder points out, that percent increase doesn't necessarily correlate to the tax increase.
"Just cause your taxes are going up X percent, that [means] your taxes are going up that same percentage — that’s not true," he said. "It’s fractional, but it is significant."
Using the Geauga County 2023 Tax Reappraisal Estimator, Walder showed News 5 a home that was valued at $372,300 in 2022, with a yearly tax bill of $6493.84. Now, that same home is valued at $541,900, but the tax bill is only slated to increase by $593.60. That equals a 9% tax increase as a result of a 45% property value increase.
In addition, Walder told News 5 that county leaders are speaking directly with local governments, local school districts and county commissioners to work to lower their piece of the property tax increases.
"We appealed to county commissioners who are a taxing authority, the local governments and the schools, and we’re asking them to offset their gain by reducing a levy that they’re issuing a tax to the residents with," he explained.
News 5 has confirmed that Geauga County and several townships have already either firmly or tentatively agreed to the idea.
Additionally, Walder encourages residents who may not agree with their new property valuation to reach out to his office to contest the value with documentation supporting their claims.
At Sugar Pines Farm in Geauga County, co-owner Jane Neubauer heard the rumblings about what was coming.
As she begins her extremely busy season of selling Christmas trees, she just received a letter from the auditor's office warning that, “this reappraisal cycle was significantly higher than past increases.”
"I like to think about taxes as little as possible," she said. "Whether you own a farm or any property in Geauga County, you were holding your breath to see how bad."
In her case, she told News 5 she was slightly relieved when she actually ran the math of how much her taxes were changing.
"Nobody wants to pay more taxes. I think we can all agree upon that," she said. "I was pleasantly surprised the amount wasn’t nearly what I saw reflected as our increased property value."
While some counties are wrapping up their reappraisals, others are just getting started.
In 2024, Cuyahoga, Erie, Huron, Lake, Lorain, Portage and Stark counties are slated to reevaluate their properties as well.
Certified property appraiser Christina Kapusi has already been contracted by Cuyahoga County and is reviewing homes, which means examining what the property looks like from the outside and determining their new value.
"We’re looking to see if the information here is what we’re looking at: garages, porches, building material, style of home," Kapusi explained.
"Every six years, we have to go out and visit all the properties physically and look at them," Cuyahoga County Residential Appraisal Manager Neil Winans explained. "It’s all based on current assessed value and what things are selling for. In a reappraisal, more than likely, especially in this market, everything is going up."
Winans told News 5 he expects it will take about six months to complete the fieldwork of evaluating homes in person.
Lawmakers looking at possible solutions to combat rising property taxes
While counties like Geauga are working on an immediate fix to their rising property taxes, lawmakers continue to work on a slightly longer-term fix.
House Bill 187, which has already passed in the House, would change how a home’s property taxes are calculated, weighing the past three years of property values, not just one. It would also eliminate the ability of the state department of taxation to mandate counties tweak their property tax values if they happen to come in too low.
"There is so much going on with our economy right now with huge increases," Rep. Thomas Hall (R-Madison Township), said. "Whether you're going to the grocery, you're paying for gas. You're paying for stuff at the pharmacy, some of the drugs that you really need to take. We need to make sure that we are not taxing people out of their own homes to add on to all of that."
That bill has passed in the House but awaits more hearings in the Senate. If passed, the bill would only stay in effect for three years, with the hope of a more long-term fix and property tax reform on the horizon.
Clay LePard is a special projects reporter at News 5 Cleveland. Follow him on Twitter @ClayLePard or on Facebook Clay LePard News 5.
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