ROCKINGHAM-The town Selectboard and the village trustees of Bellows Falls and Saxtons River have decided on new property tax rates and, over the weekend, released a tax fact sheet with the rates on the town website.
The new rates follow the 2024 property value reappraisals, the town's first in eight years, where Rockingham's Grand List saw a 50% increase in property values, its bottom line rising from $492 million to $741 million.
Tax bills for fiscal year July 1, 2025, to June 30, 2026 are being mailed now, and the first installment payment is due on Sept. 8. Additional installments are due Nov. 10, Feb. 10, and May 11.
Homeowners have been concerned about how the large jump in property values will affect their property taxes, but Paul Noble, chair of the Board of Listers, said that the majority of homeowners will not see a tax increase.
"It's pretty straightforward," Noble said. "When the Grand List goes up, tax rates come down."
That is true of the tax rates established last week.
Town and village tax rates
The combined town tax rate is what concerns most citizens, as it includes the town property tax, the school tax and, for homeowners living in Bellows Falls and Saxtons River, the additional tax for the respective village.
Also, tax rates are different for a homestead, which is a residential property with the homeowner as primary resident, and a non-homestead, which is property such as vacation homes, second homes, and investment and commercial properties.
The tax rates (rounded to cents) break down as follows:
• Rockingham's combined town and school tax is $1.88 per $100 of property valuation, with the town tax portion at $0.83 and the school portion at $1.05.
Last year's town tax rate was $1.26, so, as Noble predicted, the town tax saw a decrease of $0.42.
Rockingham Selectboard Chair Peter Golec said that "another factor to consider is the state education tax, which also was down to $1.04 compared to $1.58 last year," a 34% decrease at $0.54 per $100 of property valuation.
• In addition to the town and school tax rates, the village tax rate for Bellows Falls homeowners is an additional $0.49 per $100 and for Saxtons River it's an additional $0.11.
That makes the combined town and village tax rate for Bellows Falls $2.37 per $100 of property valuation for a homestead and $2.52 for a non-homestead.
• For Saxtons River, the combined rates are $1.99 per $100 of property valuation for a homestead and $2.14 per $100 for a non-homestead.
But even with those figures in hand, taxpayers may still not know what their actual, final tax will be.
Noble said taxpayers need to remember that when they get their property tax bills the box stating their total tax is adjusted for many taxpayers by the State Tax Rebate, which is figured based on the homeowner's income in an attempt to balance property taxes.
"We don't know the exact number," Noble said, "but from what we've been able to figure in the past, it looks like approximately 60% of Rockingham property owners qualify for some form of a property tax rebate," which will lower the bottom line.
Ongoing battle for equitable education
Vermont has been in a decades-long effort to move away from funding public education via local property taxes, going back to the passage of Act 60 in 1997. A statewide education fund finances public schools, with its revenue coming primarily from property taxes collected by towns and transferred to the state fund.
Prior to Act 60, school taxes were levied locally, creating inequalities between wealthy and less-wealthy towns.
In 2003, Act 68 attempted to refine Act 60, establishing a system where all towns would contribute to the state education fund and school districts received allocations from the fund based on their approved spending per pupil.
In further efforts to balance education funding, the state has recognized that waiting eight or 10 years to reappraise property values is too long. Towns will now be required to update property values every six years.
In the eight years since Rockingham's last reappraisal, the Case-Shiller U.S. National Home Price Index rose at least 60%. The cumulative price increase was 32% over that time due to inflation, which peaked at 8% in 2022 and has fallen to an estimated 2.54%.
That resulted in one Rockingham property assessed at $120,000 in 2017 selling for $335,000 in March 2024, and another property assessed at $130,000 selling for $360,000 in June 2024.
That notable jump in property values is the main reason for the state now requiring reappraisals every six years.
Noble said that Rockingham is "looking at five years from today" for the next reappraisal, noting that "it takes over a year to do it."
The town's median price for a single-family home is $260,500, with the average price rising to $290,000 in rural Rockingham. Average village home values are $260,000 in Saxtons River and $231,212 in Bellows Falls.
Noble said that the dramatic increase in property values across Vermont and reflected in the property value increases in Rockingham, is not, as many people believe, due to people moving to Vermont during the pandemic.
Rather, he said, Vermont property values were "low to begin with" and that sale prices here have "increased more compared to other states," a trend that predates the pandemic.
He said that the availability of high-speed internet throughout most of the state, even prior to the pandemic, has been a major factor drawing people to move to Vermont. Many jobs can now be performed online, giving more workers the option of working remotely, far away from their company's headquarters.
"Home sales in Vermont are probably 90% to out-of-state buyers," he said. "That is the driving force for property values going up. People can work remotely due to high-speed internet."
Documents concerning the tax rates can be found at rockinghamvt.org/listers.
This News item by Robert F. Smith was written for The Commons.