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Sussex County residents have until Monday, March 31, to appeal their property tax reassessment value.
After a lawsuit over Delaware’s school funding forced all three counties to reassess property tax values for the first time in decades, Sussex residents now have a chance to contest their property’s newly determined value. The county’s Board of Assessment Review will meet over the next few months to hear those cases.
You can view your property’s reassessed value and file an appeal at sussexcountyde.gov.
How much will your bill go up?
Delaware law caps the amount of additional revenue the county and school districts can generate from the reassessment. School districts can collect up to 10% more than the previous year, while the county can collect up to 15% more than the previous year, but Sussex County will remain “revenue neutral.”
Sussex County has a new property tax calculator that will estimate your new property tax bill at sussexcountyde.gov. A $500,000 home in the Cape Henlopen School District, for example, can expect an about $1,100 property tax bill. A $300,000 home in the Laurel School District will have an estimated $1,000 tax bill, and a $200,000 home in the Indian River School District will have an estimated $400 tax bill.
Once appeal decisions are finalized, the county will adopt a new property tax rate, likely in May. Because the new rate must remain revenue neutral, the increase in property values determined by the reassessment will actually cause the rate to go down. In Kent County, for example, the property tax rate went from 36 cents per $100 of assessed value to 5.72 cents per $100 of assessed value.
Right now, the property tax rate in Sussex is 44.5 cents per $100 of assessed value. This year’s property tax bills will be issued in August.
Shannon Marvel McNaught reports on southern Delaware and beyond. Reach her at smcnaught@gannett.com.