The $2 billion wealth transfer: How Cook County’s property tax appeals system rewards businesses at the expense of homeowners

Nearly $2 billion in property taxes shifted onto homeowners from businesses over just three years, with a disproportionate share of the added burden falling on lower-income Black and Latino homeowners, a first-of-its-kind analysis by the Treasurer’s Office found.

The shift largely resulted from the wide-ranging success of businesses appealing property valuations, called assessments, that determine their tax bills. From 2021 to 2023, which covers a complete three-year assessment cycle, business appeals shaved nearly $3.3 billion off the total amount billed to businesses across the county. More than $1.9 billion of that shifted onto homeowners.

Although previous studies have documented how assessment appeals shift tax burdens, the Treasurer’s Office study is the first to determine the resulting changes to the amounts billed to property owners. That analysis revealed that the percentage increases in tax amounts billed to homeowners were far greater in areas with lower-income minority populations.

“This study helps explain why many homeowners have experienced sticker shock when opening their property tax bills in recent years,” Treasurer Maria Pappas said. “We hope our findings help guide policy makers in their ongoing efforts to make the appeals system more equitable.”

Key Findings:

Businesses vs. Homeowners:
- Successful appeals by businesses caused their collective tax bills to drop by $3.3 billion, or 12.5%, while residential tax bills jumped by $1.9 billion, or 6.9%.
- Business owners appealed their assessments nearly 64% of the time, while homeowners appealed 27% of the time — with businesses winning far larger assessed value reductions.
- Business’ assessed value reductions surged to a total of $25.5 billion from 2021 to 2023 compared to $9.9 billion from 2015 to 2017. The difference is due mostly to larger reductions granted by the Board of Review. While business reductions rose, assessed value reductions for homeowners declined to $2.8 billion from $3.2 billion from 2021 to 2023.
Income & Race Disparities:
- Homeowners in the highest-income areas appealed their assessments 46% of the time, while those in the lowest-income areas appealed just 11% of the time.
- Property owners in majority Black and Latino neighborhoods appeal at far lower rates. The appeal rate for white homeowners was 35.5% compared to 10.85% in Black neighborhoods and 14.06% in Latino neighborhoods.
- The added tax burden caused by appeals did not fall equally on homeowners, with bills increasing by about 5% in high-income areas and about 10% in low-income areas, most of which had predominantly minority populations.

A Tale of Two Neighborhoods:

Two examples from the study of the tax appeals system show how wealthier white neighborhoods tend to benefit by successfully appealing, often at the expense of lower income minority neighborhoods, where homeowners saw their tax bills jump by 14.8% after the appeals process was completed during reassessment years.

In one Census tract in Gage Park, a low-income majority Latino community area on the Southwest Side where only 5.2% percent of homeowners contested their assessments, tax bills rose nearly 23% after appeals.
In one Census tract in North Center, a high-income majority white community area where 60% of homeowners appealed their assessment, tax bills rose less than 15%.

“I’m heartened that the Assessor and Board of Review are already addressing some of the underlying issues that cause this unequal shift in the tax burden, because the Cook County residents earning the least shouldn’t be shouldering the most, when it comes to taxes,” Pappas said.

A link to the full study, data and our interactive mapping tool is available here.

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Ray Hanania is an award-winning opinion columnist, author & former Chicago City Hall reporter (1977-1992). A veteran who served during the Vietnam War and the recipient of four SPJ Peter Lisagor Awards for column writing, Hanania writes weekly opinion columns on mainstream American & Chicagoland topics for the Southwest News-Herald, Des Plaines Valley News, the Regional News, The Reporter Newspapers, and Suburban Chicagoland.

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