In the days since Mayor Emanuel jacked up property taxes, I’ve been fielding calls from millennials wanting to know how much more they’ll have to pay.
Last month, Mayor Emanuel got the City Council to raise the property tax levy—how much the city spends—by roughly $588 million.
You might think that it would be as simple as this: if your assessed value goes up, your taxes go up. Oh, if it were that simple!
Berrios and his crew assess property value in Chicago every three years. And lucky us, in addition to the mayor’s property tax hike, this year we also get new assessments. Property values have rebounded in many areas thanks to overall improvements in the economy and a hot market in certain trendy neighborhoods like Logan Square and Avondale. Which means that especially in those places, assessed value is way up.
To demonstrate this point, I’ll cite the example of a guy named Ben who writes for the Reader.
So now that you understand how this stuff works, let’s take a look at four millennials randomly chosen because I know them. Our task is to see who gets screwed the most when it comes to next year’s property tax hike.
