So 2.11% overall rate. Yikes.

Though for someone who doesn't know much about this..... are homes typically assessed close to their sale price? Like if I buy a place today for $800k should I actually expect to pay $16,880/yr in property tax? How often do these assessed values get re-done?

Not sure how they calculate it but assessed value is typically lower than recent sale price

It depends, JC reassess property values once in a while. So it’s likely you’ll pay whatever it is currently assessed for for some time. Unless they decided to do city wide reassessment next year. On the flip side you can sue the city and prove that your property is worth less than they think.

And do they typically assess near market value? I feel like I've seen some places where even a freshly assessed value is like... half.

I don’t have a definitive answer. When I was looking for an apt, I saw tax assessments just below the asking price for the property and occasionally higher than the asking price.

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Finally JC tax rate is approaching the state average. I know it hurts, but just think, most towns paid higher rates than us and didn’t have their schools subsidized. Now we’re joining the misery of living in this state.

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The schools in Jersey city are horrible. At least other parts of Jersey get good schools in return for high taxes. This is unacceptable and it is like throwing money into a black hole.

Just bought outside of JC, tax rate is 3.1%, *sad tax noises.

Ouch!!

Yep, town has almost zero ratables so the full tax burden is picked up by the homeowners.

How is that possible? I’d ask where but that’s personal.

Being a little dramatic, there’s a downtown with a bunch of small businesses but theres only one supermarket and no big box stores or a big mall.

Oh damn you really left lol.

Yes, assessment is close to market value. JC did a reassessment a couple years back and there haven’t been any wild swings in market value since then.

So whatever you paid last year, you’ll pay just under a third more this year. That’s one hell of a hike. So, say, from $6K to $8K.
And to make matters worse, the increase is almost all back-loaded in the Q4 bill because JC passed their 2022 tax levy in October of 2022.
You could argue that the tax hike itself is the only issue and how it’s distributed over the year doesn’t matter. But it is hell on people trying to budget. It also makes it a pain for people that pay through an escrow account.

Unfortunately most of JC property owners have been assessed roughly 32% more property tax as compared to last year

2021 - total tax rate = 1.6% (city rate 0.60% + school rate 0.60% + county rate 0.43%)

2022 - total tax rate jumped 32% = 2.11% (city rate 0.82% + school rate 0.86% + county rate 0.43%)

For 2022 the city tax rate went up ~37%, the school tax rate went up ~43%, county tax rate stayed the same.

They only assessed the higher rate in Q3 and Q4 that's why you're seeing the bigger property tax bill now.

See the following articles for actual budget data and references and questions to ask your local representatives:

https://civicparent.org/property-taxes/

See the articles above re: what drove the tax increase.

A big thank you to Professor D'Souza CPA from St Peters for this public service website.

There was a city-wide reval about three years ago and I think most properties got close to market value but just a little under. Maybe like 90%?

Yep I found the website where you can lookup any property’s assessed value. It’s pretty close to market value. Which is brutal. Not gonna buy here

The school increase was known early enough to spread it out over Q3 and Q4. The city increase just finalized so it all has to be crammed into Q4 (which was already going to be pumped up with half the school increase).
The new bill amounts just dropped and my 2022Q4 is just under double my Q1 and Q2. This is after a roughly 33% increase in Q3. I’m fortunate to have a healthy escrow account, but a bunch of people are simply not going to be able to pay. It’s like a landlord telling you at the end of October that Oct/Nov/Dec rent is $800 more.

By “here” do you mean the state of New Jersey? We’re still a little under the state average for property tax even with the 2.1%. Average NJ property tax is 2.4%. National average is 1%.

Jersey City in particular. It’s value prop if you ask me is (relative) affordability with convenience. You don’t get suburban schools or houses, and you don’t get the best of NYC. Now drop the relative affordability and what’s left is somewhere I don’t want to buy. Maybe if taxes put downward pressure on actual home values it’ll even out, maybe.

I agree - same here.. given the bureacracies between county city and school governing organizations it would take a minor miracle to have them all coordinate any changes to the start of the calendar year rather than this retroactive nonsense.

Taxes and rising mortgage rates will certainly put downward pressure on prices, but it’s a question of how much and if it counteracts the still- present overall housing shortage.

What should we do if the escrow account cannot cover this hike? Do we need to contact escrow to charge us more? Or it’ll be automatically?

They’ll send you a letter with your options go fund it.

Thanks for sharing. This website looks pretty interesting and neat