UK council tax vs. US property tax
Aug 18th 2016, 9:05 pm
#46
Back in US & happy!
Joined: Nov 2011
Posts: 505
Re: UK council tax vs. US property tax
Don't focus entirely on the tax rates, especially on property tax, you should also look at the value of the asset being taxed.
If you can buy a nice house for $200k you may be a lot better off than if you move somewhere where a family home costs $600k, even if the tax rate on the cheaper home is relatively high.
If you can buy a nice house for $200k you may be a lot better off than if you move somewhere where a family home costs $600k, even if the tax rate on the cheaper home is relatively high.
Also, people are more important to me than property, so I will need to find a state where I will be able to make friends with like minded people. I have realised after living here for a few years that I can't live somewhere where other peoples views and level of education are completely opposite of mine.
What I do think is that the search will be fun. California isn't in the list though - I need seasons and I actually like the snowy winters.
Aug 18th 2016, 9:36 pm
#47
Account Closed
Joined: Jan 2006
Posts: 0
Re: UK council tax vs. US property tax
So a tad cheaper if you don't have to pay any exchange rate fees,which we would, so really no significant savings anymore, and and why the gas stations are mostly vacant now and some closed up altogether, we the CAD$ falls small towns on the US side suffer.
In theory I should be paying more tax in BC vs California with state/fed combined for income, but reality is I actually pay less but get more, mostly because of our income level and getting various low income tax credits that pay back some of the money we pay in sales tax and carbon tax, Canada is a bit more generous on the low income, but we don't get to deduct as many things as US folks do, as far as I know you cannot write off mortgage interest here, but can on the federal tax form in the US?
But California is a high tax state, just about any other state we would come out a head in the US.
Last edited by scrubbedexpat091; Aug 18th 2016 at 9:41 pm.
Aug 19th 2016, 3:21 am
#48
BE Forum Addict
Joined: Sep 2010
Location: Sleepy Hollow, New York
Posts: 2,536
Re: UK council tax vs. US property tax
We pay > $1,000 a month property taxes[1], but we do live in the highest taxed county in the entire USA (Westchester County, NY).
Why is it so high? Many factors:
1) Americans might claim to like small government, but they sure like to have lots of different ones: we're subject to village, town and county government, all levelling taxes even before we get to the state and federal levels. There's huge amounts of duplication and lack of economizing of scale: each of our local governments maintains police departments for instance, with overlapping jurisdictions.
2) Municipalities in the US are for the most part organized from the grassroots. In most states local governments are independent within their realm - initiatives to merge and divide jurisdictions usually have to come from the locality, the states can't reorganize local government by fiat as the UK can. This is good as it makes local government truly local unlike the huge anonymous "councils" that now exist in the UK, but it can be very inefficient. The village I live in is essentially one geographical town with its neighbour, and we share a library and school district with them, but hell would freeze over before the villages would ever merge, even though it'd clearly make so much sense for them to do so.
3) There are different expectations of what local government should do here. Our taxes pay for two trash pickups a week, plus a separate recycling pickup. In the UK many councils are moving to pickups once a fortnight or even longer. Our neighbouring village is experimenting with once a week wheelie-bin pickups, and boy are the people there unhappy about it! I wouldn't be surprised if it end with pitchforks and torches marching on the village hall! Our villages are responsible for fire coverage, and whilst it's a volunteer FD there's a *lot* of fire trucks in our area. Having worked for a UK county council, I'd say we have maybe three times as many vehicles for a similar population as in the UK.
Finally, in NYS some expensive services such as Medicaid are provided at county rather than state level as elsewhere so that's paid for from property taxes not state income tax.
4) In the UK, people simply wouldn't stand for local government taxes to be at the actual rate required to fund local services - the vast majority of local government expenditure is financed by central government block grants, rather than the council tax[2]. In the US municipalities have to fund themselves and have far wider discretion to borrow than in the UK, which can lead to crippling debt interest repayments. Like companies, the cost of employing staff for US municipalities is higher than in the UK as they have to cover their staffs' healthcare.
[1] And that's with the village granting us the lowest possible valuation on our house, the town, who also collect county and school taxes weren't so accommodating.
[2] This does help to allow poorer boroughs in the UK to provide a similar level of services as richer ones - there's much more of a "zipcode lottery" in the US.
Why is it so high? Many factors:
1) Americans might claim to like small government, but they sure like to have lots of different ones: we're subject to village, town and county government, all levelling taxes even before we get to the state and federal levels. There's huge amounts of duplication and lack of economizing of scale: each of our local governments maintains police departments for instance, with overlapping jurisdictions.
2) Municipalities in the US are for the most part organized from the grassroots. In most states local governments are independent within their realm - initiatives to merge and divide jurisdictions usually have to come from the locality, the states can't reorganize local government by fiat as the UK can. This is good as it makes local government truly local unlike the huge anonymous "councils" that now exist in the UK, but it can be very inefficient. The village I live in is essentially one geographical town with its neighbour, and we share a library and school district with them, but hell would freeze over before the villages would ever merge, even though it'd clearly make so much sense for them to do so.
3) There are different expectations of what local government should do here. Our taxes pay for two trash pickups a week, plus a separate recycling pickup. In the UK many councils are moving to pickups once a fortnight or even longer. Our neighbouring village is experimenting with once a week wheelie-bin pickups, and boy are the people there unhappy about it! I wouldn't be surprised if it end with pitchforks and torches marching on the village hall! Our villages are responsible for fire coverage, and whilst it's a volunteer FD there's a *lot* of fire trucks in our area. Having worked for a UK county council, I'd say we have maybe three times as many vehicles for a similar population as in the UK.
Finally, in NYS some expensive services such as Medicaid are provided at county rather than state level as elsewhere so that's paid for from property taxes not state income tax.
4) In the UK, people simply wouldn't stand for local government taxes to be at the actual rate required to fund local services - the vast majority of local government expenditure is financed by central government block grants, rather than the council tax[2]. In the US municipalities have to fund themselves and have far wider discretion to borrow than in the UK, which can lead to crippling debt interest repayments. Like companies, the cost of employing staff for US municipalities is higher than in the UK as they have to cover their staffs' healthcare.
[1] And that's with the village granting us the lowest possible valuation on our house, the town, who also collect county and school taxes weren't so accommodating.
[2] This does help to allow poorer boroughs in the UK to provide a similar level of services as richer ones - there's much more of a "zipcode lottery" in the US.
Aug 19th 2016, 8:16 am
#49
Lost in BE Cyberspace
Joined: Feb 2013
Posts: 6,148
Re: UK council tax vs. US property tax
We pay > $1,000 a month property taxes[1], but we do live in the highest taxed county in the entire USA (Westchester County, NY).
Why is it so high? Many factors:
1) Americans might claim to like small government, but they sure like to have lots of different ones: we're subject to village, town and county government, all levelling taxes even before we get to the state and federal levels. There's huge amounts of duplication and lack of economizing of scale: each of our local governments maintains police departments for instance, with overlapping jurisdictions.
2) Municipalities in the US are for the most part organized from the grassroots. In most states local governments are independent within their realm - initiatives to merge and divide jurisdictions usually have to come from the locality, the states can't reorganize local government by fiat as the UK can. This is good as it makes local government truly local unlike the huge anonymous "councils" that now exist in the UK, but it can be very inefficient. The village I live in is essentially one geographical town with its neighbour, and we share a library and school district with them, but hell would freeze over before the villages would ever merge, even though it'd clearly make so much sense for them to do so.
3) There are different expectations of what local government should do here. Our taxes pay for two trash pickups a week, plus a separate recycling pickup. In the UK many councils are moving to pickups once a fortnight or even longer. Our neighbouring village is experimenting with once a week wheelie-bin pickups, and boy are the people there unhappy about it! I wouldn't be surprised if it end with pitchforks and torches marching on the village hall! Our villages are responsible for fire coverage, and whilst it's a volunteer FD there's a *lot* of fire trucks in our area. Having worked for a UK county council, I'd say we have maybe three times as many vehicles for a similar population as in the UK.
Finally, in NYS some expensive services such as Medicaid are provided at county rather than state level as elsewhere so that's paid for from property taxes not state income tax.
4) In the UK, people simply wouldn't stand for local government taxes to be at the actual rate required to fund local services - the vast majority of local government expenditure is financed by central government block grants, rather than the council tax[2]. In the US municipalities have to fund themselves and have far wider discretion to borrow than in the UK, which can lead to crippling debt interest repayments. Like companies, the cost of employing staff for US municipalities is higher than in the UK as they have to cover their staffs' healthcare.
[1] And that's with the village granting us the lowest possible valuation on our house, the town, who also collect county and school taxes weren't so accommodating.
[2] This does help to allow poorer boroughs in the UK to provide a similar level of services as richer ones - there's much more of a "zipcode lottery" in the US.
Why is it so high? Many factors:
1) Americans might claim to like small government, but they sure like to have lots of different ones: we're subject to village, town and county government, all levelling taxes even before we get to the state and federal levels. There's huge amounts of duplication and lack of economizing of scale: each of our local governments maintains police departments for instance, with overlapping jurisdictions.
2) Municipalities in the US are for the most part organized from the grassroots. In most states local governments are independent within their realm - initiatives to merge and divide jurisdictions usually have to come from the locality, the states can't reorganize local government by fiat as the UK can. This is good as it makes local government truly local unlike the huge anonymous "councils" that now exist in the UK, but it can be very inefficient. The village I live in is essentially one geographical town with its neighbour, and we share a library and school district with them, but hell would freeze over before the villages would ever merge, even though it'd clearly make so much sense for them to do so.
3) There are different expectations of what local government should do here. Our taxes pay for two trash pickups a week, plus a separate recycling pickup. In the UK many councils are moving to pickups once a fortnight or even longer. Our neighbouring village is experimenting with once a week wheelie-bin pickups, and boy are the people there unhappy about it! I wouldn't be surprised if it end with pitchforks and torches marching on the village hall! Our villages are responsible for fire coverage, and whilst it's a volunteer FD there's a *lot* of fire trucks in our area. Having worked for a UK county council, I'd say we have maybe three times as many vehicles for a similar population as in the UK.
Finally, in NYS some expensive services such as Medicaid are provided at county rather than state level as elsewhere so that's paid for from property taxes not state income tax.
4) In the UK, people simply wouldn't stand for local government taxes to be at the actual rate required to fund local services - the vast majority of local government expenditure is financed by central government block grants, rather than the council tax[2]. In the US municipalities have to fund themselves and have far wider discretion to borrow than in the UK, which can lead to crippling debt interest repayments. Like companies, the cost of employing staff for US municipalities is higher than in the UK as they have to cover their staffs' healthcare.
[1] And that's with the village granting us the lowest possible valuation on our house, the town, who also collect county and school taxes weren't so accommodating.
[2] This does help to allow poorer boroughs in the UK to provide a similar level of services as richer ones - there's much more of a "zipcode lottery" in the US.
Some good points and at the end of the day it depends how your lifestyle is. For wealthier people it's fine and as long as they have their high paid jobs, paying high property taxes is not an issue.
It's a different story when you've nearly paid off the mortgage and suddenly you're unemployed and can't find a job that pays that much, have to rely on a minimum wage job etc. and that can easily happen these days.
With lower property taxes, you have a lot more security and it's easier to mange your spending with our system in many European countries. If I'm suddenly unemployed in California, I have to pay the $600 and that's it.
Here I might pay more taxes on beer and other products, but I can actually decide not to buy the products this month, or have fewer beers
It might be different in certain parts of the UK but I do find a tax system that's spread out better, especially if you love your current home and location.
Aug 19th 2016, 2:32 pm
#50
Joined: Dec 2001
Location: Dixie, ex UK
Posts: 52,446
Re: UK council tax vs. US property tax
We pay > $1,000 a month property taxes[1], but we do live in the highest taxed county in the entire USA (Westchester County, NY).
Why is it so high? Many factors:
1) Americans might claim to like small government, but they sure like to have lots of different ones: we're subject to village, town and county government, all levelling taxes even before we get to the state and federal levels. There's huge amounts of duplication and lack of economizing of scale: each of our local governments maintains police departments for instance, with overlapping jurisdictions.
2) Municipalities in the US are for the most part organized from the grassroots. In most states local governments are independent within their realm - initiatives to merge and divide jurisdictions usually have to come from the locality, the states can't reorganize local government by fiat as the UK can. This is good as it makes local government truly local unlike the huge anonymous "councils" that now exist in the UK, but it can be very inefficient. The village I live in is essentially one geographical town with its neighbour, and we share a library and school district with them, but hell would freeze over before the villages would ever merge, even though it'd clearly make so much sense for them to do so.
3) There are different expectations of what local government should do here. Our taxes pay for two trash pickups a week, plus a separate recycling pickup. In the UK many councils are moving to pickups once a fortnight or even longer. Our neighbouring village is experimenting with once a week wheelie-bin pickups, and boy are the people there unhappy about it! I wouldn't be surprised if it end with pitchforks and torches marching on the village hall! Our villages are responsible for fire coverage, and whilst it's a volunteer FD there's a *lot* of fire trucks in our area. Having worked for a UK county council, I'd say we have maybe three times as many vehicles for a similar population as in the UK.
Finally, in NYS some expensive services such as Medicaid are provided at county rather than state level as elsewhere so that's paid for from property taxes not state income tax.
4) In the UK, people simply wouldn't stand for local government taxes to be at the actual rate required to fund local services - the vast majority of local government expenditure is financed by central government block grants, rather than the council tax[2]. In the US municipalities have to fund themselves and have far wider discretion to borrow than in the UK, which can lead to crippling debt interest repayments. Like companies, the cost of employing staff for US municipalities is higher than in the UK as they have to cover their staffs' healthcare.
[1] And that's with the village granting us the lowest possible valuation on our house, the town, who also collect county and school taxes weren't so accommodating.
[2] This does help to allow poorer boroughs in the UK to provide a similar level of services as richer ones - there's much more of a "zipcode lottery" in the US.
Why is it so high? Many factors:
1) Americans might claim to like small government, but they sure like to have lots of different ones: we're subject to village, town and county government, all levelling taxes even before we get to the state and federal levels. There's huge amounts of duplication and lack of economizing of scale: each of our local governments maintains police departments for instance, with overlapping jurisdictions.
2) Municipalities in the US are for the most part organized from the grassroots. In most states local governments are independent within their realm - initiatives to merge and divide jurisdictions usually have to come from the locality, the states can't reorganize local government by fiat as the UK can. This is good as it makes local government truly local unlike the huge anonymous "councils" that now exist in the UK, but it can be very inefficient. The village I live in is essentially one geographical town with its neighbour, and we share a library and school district with them, but hell would freeze over before the villages would ever merge, even though it'd clearly make so much sense for them to do so.
3) There are different expectations of what local government should do here. Our taxes pay for two trash pickups a week, plus a separate recycling pickup. In the UK many councils are moving to pickups once a fortnight or even longer. Our neighbouring village is experimenting with once a week wheelie-bin pickups, and boy are the people there unhappy about it! I wouldn't be surprised if it end with pitchforks and torches marching on the village hall! Our villages are responsible for fire coverage, and whilst it's a volunteer FD there's a *lot* of fire trucks in our area. Having worked for a UK county council, I'd say we have maybe three times as many vehicles for a similar population as in the UK.
Finally, in NYS some expensive services such as Medicaid are provided at county rather than state level as elsewhere so that's paid for from property taxes not state income tax.
4) In the UK, people simply wouldn't stand for local government taxes to be at the actual rate required to fund local services - the vast majority of local government expenditure is financed by central government block grants, rather than the council tax[2]. In the US municipalities have to fund themselves and have far wider discretion to borrow than in the UK, which can lead to crippling debt interest repayments. Like companies, the cost of employing staff for US municipalities is higher than in the UK as they have to cover their staffs' healthcare.
[1] And that's with the village granting us the lowest possible valuation on our house, the town, who also collect county and school taxes weren't so accommodating.
[2] This does help to allow poorer boroughs in the UK to provide a similar level of services as richer ones - there's much more of a "zipcode lottery" in the US.
Where we live now we pay annual property taxes that are barely more than what we faced paying per month in Westchester.
Last edited by Pulaski; Aug 19th 2016 at 2:40 pm.
Aug 19th 2016, 2:58 pm
#51
Lost in BE Cyberspace
Joined: Jul 2008
Location: Portlandia Metro
Posts: 7,425
Re: UK council tax vs. US property tax
Somebody should create a heat map of property taxes. I would be interested to know where the best value for money places to live are.
Aug 19th 2016, 3:10 pm
#52
Joined: Dec 2001
Location: Dixie, ex UK
Posts: 52,446
Re: UK council tax vs. US property tax
While it might be "interesting", as discussed above, it would be largely useless unless you had no income and made no purchases because while there are places with low property taxes, "they" get you with income and sales taxes instead.
Aug 19th 2016, 3:38 pm
#53
BE Forum Addict
Joined: Aug 2013
Location: Athens GA
Posts: 2,134
Re: UK council tax vs. US property tax
https://wallethub.com/edu/states-wit...y-taxes/11585/
Aug 19th 2016, 3:48 pm
#54
Lost in BE Cyberspace
Joined: Jul 2008
Location: Portlandia Metro
Posts: 7,425
Re: UK council tax vs. US property tax
Also it doesn't seem to take into account levies. 50% of my tax bill are levies for schools and fire.
Aug 19th 2016, 3:53 pm
#56
Lost in BE Cyberspace
Joined: Jul 2008
Location: Portlandia Metro
Posts: 7,425
Re: UK council tax vs. US property tax
I agree tax is tax, but they call it by a different name and allow home owners and renters to vote if they want to pay for the levy/tax.
Aug 19th 2016, 3:58 pm
#57
Austin. TX.
Joined: Sep 2013
Posts: 5,930
Re: UK council tax vs. US property tax
Aug 19th 2016, 4:14 pm
#58
Back in US & happy!
Joined: Nov 2011
Posts: 505
Re: UK council tax vs. US property tax
Here's just one of many that gives a guide but, as Pulaski says, it is largely useless for best value for money places to live without knowing the other ways they get you with income tax, sales tax etc.
https://wallethub.com/edu/states-wit...y-taxes/11585/
https://wallethub.com/edu/states-wit...y-taxes/11585/
So as Pulaski says, relying on just one factor is useless for deciding the best place to live. My list of must haves for our next house, which hopefully we will buy, is quite long and our overall tax bill will be taken into account, but isn't the most important factor. After all, what use is a very low property tax if you hate where you live, hate the neighbours, hate the house
Aug 19th 2016, 4:18 pm
#59
Back in US & happy!
Joined: Nov 2011
Posts: 505
Re: UK council tax vs. US property tax
So looking at that guide again, I certainly wouldn't swap our property tax of 1.58% in NYS for 0.84% in Arizona, I couldn't cope with the summers there!!
Aug 19th 2016, 4:24 pm
#60
Account Closed
Joined: Jan 2006
Posts: 0
Re: UK council tax vs. US property tax
Issue here is property is so overvalued, many have trouble with the taxes since their income doesn't match their 1 million dollar home which may have only been 300,000 10-15 years ago.
I do believe their are some programs for seniors however to help defer taxes until they sell or die, and then I think the remaining amount is due.
They are honestly not bad once your used to it, I didn't thinkI could either, but eh its a dry heat which does make a difference, but its a bit of a backwards state so if forward thinking or liberal it may not be the best choice.
I do believe their are some programs for seniors however to help defer taxes until they sell or die, and then I think the remaining amount is due.
They are honestly not bad once your used to it, I didn't thinkI could either, but eh its a dry heat which does make a difference, but its a bit of a backwards state so if forward thinking or liberal it may not be the best choice.
Last edited by scrubbedexpat091; Aug 19th 2016 at 4:28 pm.