FAQs

Please See Property Tax Relief page for more information.

Typically no, except if a homestead exemption had been omitted or if an incorrect occupancy date was used for new construction.

You have the right to inspect the assessor’s records, which contain assessed values as well as other information. You may inspect the records for any parcel of property, as well as the records for your own property, subject to reasonable regulations established by the assessor. Also, every four years when all property is viewed and reassessed, a complete list of property assessments is published in a newspaper of general circulation in you county.

For tax purposes, the legal assessment level of non-agricultural property in any county is 33 1/3% of its market value. To estimate market value, the assessor generally uses three approaches. The first approach is to find properties which have sold recently that are comparable to the property being assessed. The second approach, the “cost approach ,” is an estimate of how much money it would take to replace the property with one similar to it. The third approach known as the “income approach” is used to assess property such as an apartment of office building which produce income. State law requires that all real property be reassessed every four years. To determine whether your assessment is fair, you must have two items of information. First, you must know the market value of your property. This is defined as the most probable sale price of a property in a competitive and open market, assuming that the buyer and seller are acting prudently and knowledgeably, allowing sufficient time for the sale, and assuming that the transaction is not affected by undue pressures. Second, you need to know the assessed value of your property. With this information you will be able to determine the percentage of full value at which your property is assessed. The percentage of value at which your property is assessed should be similar to the percentage of other properties in your county.

See Special Valuations

You can file a complaint with the County Board of Review. If you are dissatisfied with the Board’s decision, you may appeal the decision to the State Property Tax Appeal Board, or you may pay your taxes under protest and take the matter to court.

The county will place a lien against your property. This lien may be sold by the county to recover the amount of the taxes due.

Generally, yes, it is too late unless you have already taken your complaint to the County Board of Review, State Property Tax Appeal Board or Administrative Review in the courts.

Revenue raised from property taxes supports over 6,000 units of local government in Illinois, including 1,000 elementary and secondary school districts. About 58% of your property tax goes to elementary and secondary school districts. Cities, counties, townships, community colleges, and special purpose taxing districts other than school districts share the rest.

Your taxes may be high (or higher than they were last year) for any or all of three general reasons. First, the taxing districts in which your property is located may have asked for more property tax money than they received the year before. A district may ask for more tax money because of inflationary pressure, because it plans to provide more services, or because other revenues are being reduced. Second, your tax bill may be higher than bills for similar properties in the same district because your property is overassessed relative to these properties. Third, your taxes may be high because other properties in a taxing district are receiving statutorily allowed exemptions or preferential assessments. Preferential treatment which lowers taxes on some properties will increase the tax burden on the remaining taxable properties.

• The property values in the area are changing.
• Improvements were made to the property (e.g., and addition to your home extensive remodeling; a new deck, porch, or patio).
• The property was incorrectly assessed in relation to similar type properties or an error in computation was discovered and has been corrected.

When the Supervisor of Assessment finishes the assessments in each year of a general assessment, he publishes a full list of assessments and in addition mails a notice to each owner. In years when there is no general assessment, only the changes, other than equalizition changes, must be published and mailed. Publication must be made on or before December 31.