Real Estate Taxes by State

Real Estate Taxes by State:

The monthly mortgage payment (principal and interest) is the largest component of home ownership.  But the taxes on the property are the second highest cost of homeownership and is greatly impacting migration in the U.S.

How does your state stack up?

Real-Estate Property Taxes by State

State

Effective Real-Estate Tax Rate

State Median Home Value

Annual Taxes on

Home Priced at State Median Value

Alabama 0.43% $125,500 $543
Alaska 1.18% $250,000 $2,956
Arizona 0.81% $167,500 $1,356
Arkansas 0.62% $111,400 $693
California 0.81% $385,500 $3,104
Colorado 0.60% $247,800 $1,489
Connecticut 1.97% $270,500 $5,327
Delaware 0.54% $231,500 $1,243
District of Columbia 0.56% $475,800 $2,665
Florida 1.06% $159,000 $1,686
Georgia 0.94% $148,100 $1,397
Hawaii 0.27% $515,300 $1,406
Idaho 0.76% $162,900 $1,246
Illinois 2.30% $173,800 $3,995
Indiana 0.87% $124,200 $1,085
Iowa 1.48% $129,200 $1,916
Kansas 1.40% $132,000 $1,849
Kentucky 0.85% $123,200 $1,042
Louisiana 0.49% $144,100 $707
Maine 1.30% $173,800 $2,259
Maryland 1.10% $286,900 $3,142
Massachusetts 1.20% $333,100 $3,989
Michigan 1.78% $122,400 $2,174
Minnesota 1.18% $186,200 $2,200
Mississippi 0.79% $103,100 $813
Missouri 1.00% $138,400 $1,387
Montana 0.85% $193,500 $1,652
Nebraska 1.85% $133,200 $2,467
Nevada 0.85% $173,700 $1,481
New Hampshire 2.15% $237,300 $5,100
New Jersey 2.35% $315,900 $7,410
New Mexico 0.74% $160,300 $1,188
New York 1.62% $283,400 $4,600
North Carolina 0.85% $154,900 $1,322
North Dakota 1.12% $153,800 $1,722
Ohio 1.56% $129,900 $2,032
Oklahoma 0.88% $117,900 $1,036
Oregon 1.08% $237,300 $2,563
Pennsylvania 1.53% $166,000 $2,533
Rhode Island 1.63% $238,000 $3,884
South Carolina 0.57% $139,900 $798
South Dakota 1.34% $140,500 $1,879
Tennessee 0.75% $142,100 $1,062
Texas 1.90% $136,000 $2,578
Utah 0.68% $215,900 $1,472
Vermont 1.74% $217,500 $3,795
Virginia 0.80% $245,000 $1,948
Washington 1.08% $259,500 $2,805
West Virginia 0.58% $103,800 $607
Wisconsin 1.96% $165,800 $3,248
Wyoming 0.61% $194,800 $1,196

State Tax Rates as of 2015 (most recent data for all states) source: Wallet Hub

What Happened to Rates Last Week?

Mortgage backed securities (FNMA 3.50 MBS) gained +24 basis points (BPS) from last Friday’s close which caused fixed mortgage rates to move slightly lower from the prior week.

Overview:  We had a holiday shortened week.  Overall, the limited economic data that hit the markets showed was fairly strong but Friday’ Consumer Price Index showed that core prices (ex the volatile food and energy categories) rose at only 1.7% which is well below the Fed’s target inflation rate of 2.0%.  This pushed MBS to their highest levels of the week which means that we saw the lowest mortgage rates of the week right after that report.

Inflation?  The Core (ex-food and energy) CPI for September matched the same pace as August which was 1.7%.  The market was expecting a slight increase to 1.8%.  The headline CPI hit 2.2% which was a good increase from August’s pace of 1.9%.  But the bottom line is that the core number is still well below 2% which is favorable to bonds.

Retail Sales:  Showed some very solid gains with the ex-Autos number jumping by 1.0% vs est of only 0.3%.  However, much of the spike is contributed to buying supplies, etc due to rebuilding from the hurricanes.  Headline Retail Sales which includes Autos increased by 1.6% vs est of 1.7%, a slight miss but a big pick up from August’s pace of -0.1%. Consumer Sentiment:  Wow!  The September data never really showed any type of dip due to the hurricanes and now the preliminary October data is off the charts with a triple digit reading of 101.1 which is the highest readings in 10 years.

Jobs, Jobs, Jobs:   The August Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) showed a very large amount of unfilled jobs just waiting for skilled workers and hit 6.082M which is a very slight pullback from July’s level of 6.140M but still just below historic highs.  This basically means that the labor market will continue to tighten with an Unemployment Rate of only 4.2%, we have a tremendous amount of open jobs and the only way to fill them will be to pilfer employees from a competitor…and in the process pay up to get them to make the switch.

What to Watch Out For This Week: