Resident Tax Exemption in Somerville

[smoterh.livejournal.com]

Hi there,

I bought a two family last April in Somerville and I heard that if you reside in your own place you get a tax exemption or something like that.
Two questions - does anybody have any ideas on where I can find info on residential tax exemption for Somerville?  Second question is how is this supposed to work on a 2 family property where I live in half of the whole house.  I lied, third question, how can this all be worked out when it is my mortgage lender that pays my taxes to Somerville.

Thanks
Hugo

Comments

[ron_newman]

http://faqs.somervillema.intelligovsoftware.com/residentialexemption.aspx

[jennyelfenmass.livejournal.com]

This (http://www.somervillema.gov/CoS_Content/documents/2010ResidentionExemptionInstructions.pdf) should answer some of your questions.

And here's a form link (http://www.somervillema.gov/CoS_Content/documents/forms/FY20109ResidentialExemptionDocumentation+Form.pdf)

[clevernonsense.livejournal.com]

I recall that the bank owning my last mortgage had a special escrow type account that the monthly tax payments went into, since Cambridge collected these taxes quarterly. I think something else went into it as well. But, anyhow, this meant the monthly payments would be adjusted at somewhat regular periods. I'm guessing different banks do it differently, so you might want to call them after you get the exemption.

[afty.livejournal.com]

The easiest way to get these questions answered is to call the assessor's office. If the previous owner of your house was receiving the residential exemption, you should get it automatically. Otherwise you won't be able to receive the exemption until you've lived in the house for around a year.

Our property taxes are paid by our mortgage company, and we still receive the residential exemption. It's not a problem.

[emcicle.livejournal.com]

i'm sure somerville will figure it out for you. :)

but, on the mortgage escrow front.... our first mortgage (we have refinanced since) took out money for escrow/taxes and totally screwed us in paying the taxes (sometimes over paying by double, sometimes underpaying) it was a huge pain in the ass.... when we refinanced, we stipulated no escrow and we would handle our taxes. it's been much better since then. Just a word for you to keep an eye on that part.

[narya.livejournal.com]

i'm sure somerville will figure it out for you

Last I checked, they actually don't do it automatically. To get the residential exemption you needed to actually file the paperwork.

[emcicle.livejournal.com]

i was being mostly sarcastic.... I live on the Cambridge side, and have been here 9 years, so i don't remember how it got worked out for the residential exemption. I do remember that it didn't come into play until the first full year you lived here...

[narya.livejournal.com]

Yeah, in Somerville it's based on whether the property was owner-occupied on January 1. I just wanted to make sure the OP didn't take the comment seriously :-).

[pjmorgan.livejournal.com]

I think you have to have really high levels of equity to be able to say no to escrow.

[narya.livejournal.com]

It depends on the company, many of them will let you out of it for an up-front fee. I believe we were given the option.

[maggiebex.livejournal.com]

By law in Massachusetts, you have to have a minimum percentage of equity, possibly as high as 40%, to avoid the escrow tax payments.

[narya.livejournal.com]

Interesting, do you have a source for that? I'm curious because we just refinanced and were given the option. (Maybe if we'd tried to take it they would have realized it wasn't actually available or something.)

[maggiebex.livejournal.com]

I only know the general, and not the specific, because this is what my mortgage bank told me when I complained that they were *not* paying my property tax. i had thought they were, so i didn't pay and got in trouble, and they explained to me that my mortgage had not been set up that way. Apparently I had put down enough of a down payment that the law did not require me to have the escrow account, so they never bothered to ask me if I wanted it anyway at the closing.

[chenoameg.livejournal.com]

I'm positive that's not true.

[laryu.livejournal.com]

Definitely not true. I've financed and refinanced, I think, 7 times in the past 12 years. Whether or not to escrow is sometimes but not always stipulated by agreement with the mortgagor. Not a legal requirement.

[emcicle.livejournal.com]

ha ha, i thought we were the only ones who have refinanced a million times! :)

[chenoameg.livejournal.com]

I don't know what you mean about really high levels of equity; we've not had escrow since our first refinance.

But whether or not you have escrow the property tax charged will be lower if you notify the city your property is owner-occupied.

[emcicle.livejournal.com]

we had 20% equity (had put 20% down when we purchased) and had no problems refinancing with no escrow.

[coeceo.livejournal.com]

Side:

You should make sure you have a Homestead set up. Your broker/agent/lawyer or someone should be able to tell you how, or do it free.
http://www.sec.state.ma.us/rod/rodhom/homidx.htm