US Property Tax Insights

Property tax rates vary by more than 10x across America. New Jersey has the highest average effective property tax rate at 2.21%, while Hawaii averages just 0.24%. This spread is driven by state tax policy, local government structure, and how schools are funded.

The national median is deceptive. While the national average effective rate is 0.91%, most counties fall in the 0.5%–1.5% range. A long tail of high-tax counties in New Jersey, Illinois, and Texas pulls the average upward.

Home value and tax rate are only loosely correlated. Some of the most expensive housing markets (like California and Hawaii) have relatively low effective rates due to assessment caps, while some lower-value markets in the Midwest have crushing rates to fund schools and services.

How to read these charts. Use the state rankings to compare all 50 states side by side. The histogram shows how many counties fall into each tax rate bracket. The scatter plot reveals the relationship between home value and tax rate. Finally, the top and bottom county rankings show the extreme ends of the property tax spectrum.