Somerville's Residential tax exemption

[billharnois.livejournal.com]

Can someone please give me an explanation of the Somerville Residential tax exemption for dummies? It is just an additional exemption beyond what other cities get? Is Somerville the only city that does this? When did they start doing this? How is Somerville able to do this, and what's the motivation? Are they trying to promote people who live in the properties that they own? It seems like a good thing for home owners, right?

Comments

[ceo]

They have a tax exemption for dummies? I'm as much of a bleeding-heart liberal as the next guy, but that seems a bit much. :-)

[mm-ll-kk.livejournal.com]

The residential exemption that some cities give is expressly to promote owner-occupancy. Around the area, I know that Brookline also has one, while Newton does not. Not sure what the history of it is in Somerville.

As long as you live in the house/condo you own, you're eligible...just fill out the form (you can download it from the city's website) and send it in with proof of residency, and they'll apply the exemption to your tax bill. It will take $150,000-ish off the valuation of your property, so if your place is assessed at $350,000, you will only pay taxes on $200,000 (resulting in a roughly $1,500 annual savings).

RTE

[emcicle.livejournal.com]

Cambridge also has a residential tax exemption

[joylewis.livejournal.com]

*snort*

[ron_newman]

you beat me to that one

[hiddenbear.livejournal.com]

You have to have owned your place January 1 of the previous year. What they don't tell you though is that that is the previous tax year. I believe that Somerville tax years start somewhere in June. So if you owned your place 1/1/06, then you would be eligible somewhere around 6/1/06.
But if you bought your place 1/2/06, you wouldn't be eligible until 6/1/07.

It's really easy to fill out the form and bring it by City Hall (on Highland). And they will tell you if you are eligible or not.

Cambridge has one too.

[hakamadare.livejournal.com]

URL for the form:

http://www.ci.somerville.ma.us/CoS_Content/documents/forms/ResidentialExemption.pdf (http://www.ci.somerville.ma.us/CoS_Content/documents/forms/ResidentialExemption.pdf)

-steve

[rollzroix.livejournal.com]

When I bought my house I was eligible immediately (I never paid taxes on the full assessment). I don't know if that is only because the previous owner was also an owner-occupier?

[matthew miller (from livejournal.com)]

Which is works out conveniently for the city but not so much for many new residents -- since most home sales are in the spring, most people end up going over a year without the exemption.

[lena-a-mermaid.livejournal.com]

If the previous owner also had the residential exemption then you will get the exemption on your first couple of tax bills depending upon when you buy the house because the taxes were calculated for that previous owner. It takes a while for the deed and tax info to catch up. Then you fill out the form and when the taxes get re-written addressed to you, you'll get the exemption. So when I moved into my house I got the exemption on the tax bills right away based on the prior owner's status.

I'm not sure if that made total sense the way I wrote it, but if you call the tax department at city hall, they will be able to explain the whole thing to you.

Originally when this was put in place, I think that Somerville had to get a homerule petition passed by the legislature to allow it.