States With Lower Property Taxes: What the Numbers Actually Mean for You
If you're comparing states — whether you're thinking about moving, or just wondering how your current bill stacks up — effective property tax rates (your annual tax as a percentage of your home's market value) tell you more than nominal rates alone. This page walks through which states tend to land at the lower end, why the numbers vary so much, and what they do and don't tell you about your own bill.
Which States Consistently Have Lower Effective Property Tax Rates?
The states most commonly cited at the low end of effective property tax rates include Hawaii, Alabama, Colorado, Louisiana, and Wyoming. A few patterns explain why they cluster together:
- Hawaii assesses residential property at a low fraction of market value and caps annual increases, keeping effective rates well under 0.3% for most owner-occupied homes — even though home prices are among the highest in the country.
- Alabama and Louisiana both use low assessment ratios (meaning only a portion of market value is taxable) and have relatively modest local spending needs funded through property tax, pushing effective rates below 0.5% in many counties.
- Colorado and Wyoming benefit from either statutory rate limits or constitutional caps on how fast assessed values can rise, which holds down bills even when home prices climb.
Delaware, South Carolina, and West Virginia also show up repeatedly in the lower tier. These figures come from census and tax-foundation data aggregated across counties — your specific county rate could sit well above or below the state average. Always check your county assessor's website for the local mill rate (dollars of tax per $1,000 of assessed value) that actually applies to your address.
High-Rate States: Where Bills Tend to Run the Highest
For context, the states where effective rates tend to run highest include New Jersey, Illinois, Connecticut, New Hampshire, and Vermont. New Jersey's effective rate regularly exceeds 2%, meaning a home assessed at market value pays roughly $1 for every $50 of home value each year. If you live in one of these states and your assessed value looks inflated, the dollar impact of an appeal is proportionally larger — worth examining carefully.
How to Use This Context If You Think Your Bill Is Too High
State averages tell you whether you're in a high- or low-burden environment, but they don't tell you whether your specific assessment is accurate. Your assessed value is the number you can actually challenge — the rate is set by your local taxing authority and can't be appealed.
If your assessed value looks higher than what comparable nearby homes sold for, that gap is the basis of an appeal (called a protest in Texas) — and the process is free to file yourself. Whether it's worth your time depends on how large that gap is and how much the local mill rate turns it into dollar savings.
Appeal deadlines are tight — typically 30 to 90 days from your assessment notice — and missing them locks in your bill for the year. Check your filing window now at your county assessor's office.
Bottom line: state rankings give useful context, but your leverage lies in your local assessed value — and that's something you can check, challenge, and potentially change on your own.
Effective Property Tax Rates in All 51 States and the District of Columbia
The percentage a state advertises is rarely the percentage owners pay, because exemptions, assessment ratios and local levies all sit between the two. A comparison that works has to start from what households actually paid. The figures below do: they come from the Census Bureau's American Community Survey, which records the median real estate tax paid by owner-occupied households and the median value of those homes in every state. Dividing one by the other gives an effective rate that is comparable across state lines.
The spread is larger than most people expect. New Jersey sits at 2.23% and Hawaii at 0.27% — a factor of 8.3. The median state is at 0.82%. Below, every state and the District of Columbia in one table, ranked from the highest effective rate down.
Effective Property Tax Rate in Every State, Highest to Lowest
| Rank | State | Effective rate | Median tax paid | Median home value |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | New Jersey | 2.23% | $9,541 | $427,600 |
| 2 | Illinois | 2.07% | $5,189 | $250,500 |
| 3 | Connecticut | 1.92% | $6,575 | $343,200 |
| 4 | New Hampshire | 1.77% | $6,505 | $367,200 |
| 5 | Vermont | 1.71% | $4,956 | $290,500 |
| 6 | New York | 1.60% | $6,450 | $403,000 |
| 7 | Texas | 1.58% | $4,111 | $260,400 |
| 8 | Wisconsin | 1.51% | $3,746 | $247,400 |
| 9 | Nebraska | 1.50% | $3,350 | $223,800 |
| 10 | Iowa | 1.43% | $2,795 | $195,900 |
| 11 | Ohio | 1.36% | $2,712 | $199,200 |
| 12 | Pennsylvania | 1.35% | $3,241 | $240,500 |
| 13 | Rhode Island | 1.32% | $4,854 | $368,800 |
| 14 | Kansas | 1.30% | $2,643 | $203,400 |
| 15 | Michigan | 1.28% | $2,795 | $217,600 |
| 16 | Alaska | 1.14% | $3,785 | $333,300 |
| 17 | Massachusetts | 1.11% | $5,813 | $525,800 |
| 18 | Maine | 1.10% | $2,926 | $266,400 |
| 19 | South Dakota | 1.09% | $2,590 | $236,800 |
| 20 | Minnesota | 1.04% | $3,184 | $305,500 |
| 21 | Maryland | 1.00% | $3,989 | $397,700 |
| 22 | North Dakota | 0.99% | $2,392 | $241,100 |
| 23 | Missouri | 0.88% | $1,887 | $215,600 |
| 24 | Washington | 0.84% | $4,361 | $519,800 |
| 25 | Oregon | 0.83% | $3,767 | $454,200 |
| 26 | Oklahoma | 0.82% | $1,520 | $185,900 |
| 27 | Georgia | 0.81% | $2,214 | $272,900 |
| 28 | Florida | 0.79% | $2,555 | $325,000 |
| 29 | Kentucky | 0.77% | $1,472 | $192,300 |
| 30 | Montana | 0.75% | $2,535 | $338,100 |
| 31 | Virginia | 0.74% | $2,686 | $360,700 |
| 32 | Indiana | 0.74% | $1,496 | $201,600 |
| 33 | Mississippi | 0.74% | $1,189 | $161,400 |
| 34 | New Mexico | 0.72% | $1,669 | $232,200 |
| 35 | California | 0.71% | $4,926 | $695,400 |
| 36 | North Carolina | 0.70% | $1,815 | $259,400 |
| 37 | Wyoming | 0.58% | $1,659 | $285,100 |
| 38 | District of Columbia | 0.58% | $4,180 | $724,600 |
| 39 | Arkansas | 0.57% | $1,003 | $175,300 |
| 40 | Louisiana | 0.55% | $1,146 | $208,700 |
| 41 | Tennessee | 0.55% | $1,400 | $256,800 |
| 42 | West Virginia | 0.54% | $835 | $155,600 |
| 43 | Idaho | 0.53% | $2,006 | $376,000 |
| 44 | Utah | 0.53% | $2,412 | $455,000 |
| 45 | Delaware | 0.53% | $1,731 | $326,800 |
| 46 | Arizona | 0.52% | $1,858 | $358,900 |
| 47 | South Carolina | 0.51% | $1,199 | $236,700 |
| 48 | Colorado | 0.49% | $2,448 | $502,200 |
| 49 | Nevada | 0.49% | $1,970 | $406,100 |
| 50 | Alabama | 0.38% | $738 | $195,100 |
| 51 | Hawaii | 0.27% | $2,183 | $808,200 |
A low rate is not the same as a low bill. Hawaii has the lowest effective rate in the country at 0.27%, and the median household there still pays $2,183 — more than in Alabama ($738) at 0.38%, nearly 1 times the rate. The reason is the denominator: the median Hawaii home is valued at $808,200 against $195,100 in Alabama. California shows the same effect from the other side — rank 35 by rate at 0.71%, but a median bill of $4,926 because the median home is worth $695,400. If you are comparing places to live, the two columns on the right matter more than the one on the left.
What the ranking means for an appeal. At 2.23% in New Jersey, every $10,000 of assessed value removed from your assessment is worth about $223 a year — against $27 in Hawaii at 0.27%. The same error in the same dollar amount produces an outcome 8 times larger depending on which side of a state line the house stands on. That is the whole argument for why appealing is routine in some states and rare in others: not different rules, different stakes.
Reading These Numbers: Common Questions
Why do these figures differ from the rate my county publishes?
Because a published rate is applied to assessed value, and assessed value is rarely the same as market value. States assess at a third, at 40%, at full value, or at something capped by law. The effective rate here divides tax actually paid by home value actually held, which removes that difference and is why the numbers are comparable at all.
Is the effective rate what I personally pay?
No, and it is worth being precise about this. The median tax paid and the median home value are medians of two different distributions, so their quotient describes a state, not a household. Your own rate depends on your assessment, your exemptions and the specific districts that levy on your property.
How current is this data?
It is the American Community Survey five-year estimate covering 2019 through 2023, which is the most recent five-year release. Five-year estimates are used rather than one-year because they cover every state and county reliably, including small ones. They lag the present by design.
Does a low-tax state mean lower housing costs overall?
Not reliably. States with low effective property tax rates frequently carry higher home prices, higher income tax, or higher sales tax — and several of the lowest-rate states have the highest median bills in absolute terms. Property tax is one line in a larger comparison.
If my state has a low rate, is appealing still worth it?
It is worth less per dollar of over-assessment, and that is the whole difference. The work is the same, the filing is free in most states, and a reduction normally carries into later years. What changes with the rate is the size of the return, not whether the mechanism exists.
Where does the money actually go?
Overwhelmingly to school districts, with counties, municipalities and special districts taking the rest. That split is why a reduction in assessed value is usually worth more than the county rate alone suggests — every levy applies to the same value.
Source. U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 2019–2023 five-year estimates: table B25103 (median real estate taxes paid, owner-occupied housing units) and table B25077 (median value, owner-occupied housing units). The effective rate is computed as median tax divided by median value for each of the 51 states and the District of Columbia. Puerto Rico is excluded. Ranks run from the highest effective rate downward.