How to Reduce Your Property Taxes

If you think you may be paying too much in property taxes, there are two ways to go about reducing them.

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How can you reduce your property taxes? There are a couple of easy ways to do this. 

The first way is to make sure you are receiving all the exemptions you qualify for. There are many that could apply to you.

The second way is to speak to an attorney about appealing your taxes. If you look around your neighborhood and think “I may be paying too much,” ask your Realtor about this. A Realtor will take a look, and if we get the idea that you may be overpaying on your taxes, then we’ll take that to an attorney who specializes in appealing taxes and ask them to take a look at your case.

The attorney will usually do an initial evaluation and determine whether you’re paying too much. If you are overpaying, then ordinarily that attorney will handle all the paperwork and processes for you. They will take it to the county assessor, and they should get your property taxes reduced. Often, you won’t owe them anything unless it’s a successful appeal. But how you pay will depend on that specific attorney. 

If you look around your neighborhood and think “I may be paying too much,” ask your Realtor about this.

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So if you think you’re paying too much in property taxes and would like to look into that, give me a call. I can get you on the right path. If you have any other real estate questions, you can also give me a call or send me an email, I would love to help you.

What’s Happening in the New Lenox Market?

Today I’m going over a market analysis for New Lenox to show you what trends are happening with local real estate.

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What’s going on with New Lenox real estate?

To start, is the New Lenox market in a buyer’s market or seller’s market? We figure that out by looking at the number of homes on the market compared to the six-month purchasing pattern. In New Lenox, there have been 199 homes sold over the past six months. Right now, there are 132 homes on the market, which means there are about four months of inventory available. So, if no other homes came on the market starting right now, it would take four months to sell everything currently listed. 

This means New Lenox is in a seller’s market. Keep in mind that doesn’t mean it’s a bad time to buy, it just means the market is just favoring sellers right now. 

Right now the average sales price is $293,000, and usually prices go up in a seller’s market. However, there are a few factors that are keeping prices pretty steady. One is that interest rates have gone up, which has made borrowing more expensive. Consequently, it’s harder for buyers to come in and offer a higher price. 

The second factor is that millennials are of homebuying age. Millennials are predicted to be the biggest group of homebuyers in the country very soon, but their rate of savings is very low. In fact, only 8% of millennials have savings of over $10,000 built up, which is the amount they’d need to make a decent down payment. 72% of millennials have less than $1,000 and 31% have absolutely no savings at all. That hinders millennials from buying, which hinders the market in general. 

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72% of millennials have less than $1,000 and 31% have absolutely no savings at all.

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Baby boomers are banking on the equity in their homes to sell and move into retirement. However, if prices are not going up for them, they are reluctant to put their homes on the market, which contributes to a lack of inventory. 

The average sales price is creeping up, but it’s still not shooting up the way it is in other markets in the nation. 

So, because prices are stable in New Lenox, right now is a great time to buy or sell. 

If you have any questions or would like me to do a market analysis for your area, please feel free to give me a call or send me an email. I look forward to hearing from you!