If you’ve been a business owner over the last decade, you’ve probably seen your property taxes go up year after year. You may feel like taxes do nothing but go up and that it’s always going to be a financial liability as you have to pay more and more money to the government just to keep running your business the same way that you were before.
But is this how commercial property taxes work? Or could they go down?
They are tied to the value of the property
The thing to remember is that the value of your property itself is what determines how much you have to pay in taxes. So, should the value of that property drop, then you could expect the property taxes to fall at the same time.
The reason that you may feel like taxes only go up is that property values in the United States have been on a historic rise in recent years. If you bought your business in 2012, that was right after the economic recession of 2009. Property values were quite low, so people who bought at this time may have seen their values double or even triple since then.
That does not mean that this increase is going to continue to happen forever. Commercial property values are different than residential values because they depend on the level of economic activity in the area, the location of the property and much more. It’s not just about the demand for housing, but how active other businesses are in the area.
If you believe that you’re being taxed unfairly or that you’ve been asked to pay far more than you should, it may be time to look into your legal options.