Property Tax Bills Set to Jump in Cook County For 2009 Tax Year

Seeing Red?

If you live in Cook County, you may have noticed an incremental increase in your real estate tax bill.  The first installment of your real estate bill, for the first half of the 2009 tax year for Chicago real estate, has traditionally amounted to half the previous year’s total tax bill.  The bill which was mailed last Friday, reflected a new state law apparently just Cook County, requires that 55% of your taxes are due March 2.  This amounts to a 10% increase in the tax amount to be paid.  Is your Chicago property tax escrow account able to cover this additional amount?

County Treasurer Maria Pappas inserted within the envelope a friendly explanation of the increases of the property tax bill to homeowners.  Welcome to 2010 from your kindly tax collector.  Even though Chicagoland has seen a sharp decline in home values over the past couple years, of which the  assessors calculates your property tax burden, not to worry, your Cook County property taxes are going up.

This increase is designed to help “ make the two installments more equal this year to blunt the effect of the expiration of a state law that limited increases in Cook County residential property tax bills caused by rising home values before the real-estate bubble burst“, quoted the Chicago Tribune.  In other words, expect an equal or greater property tax bill come fall of 2010, just in time for the elections.