As property taxes continue to climb in the city, mayoral hopefuls Bill de Blasio and Joe Lhota both pay less for their upscale digs than many homeowners.
De Blasio owns a pair of two-family homes on 11th Street in Park Slope that are valued at more than $1.1 million apiece. He pays $2,900 in taxes for each home. Lhota owns a penthouse duplex at a Pierrepont Street co-op in Brooklyn Heights that asks $1.7 million on average for a unit. He pays $11,000 in taxes.
By comparison, owners of a $600,000 three-family home in Bedford-Stuyvesant, or a $540,000 two-family home in Canarsie, pay about $6,000. A condo in Harlem that sold for $329,000 has a property tax bill of more than $16,000, the New York Daily News reported.
De Blasio and Lhota have included reform of property tax inequities in their campaigns. No specific proposals have been provided. The Democratic nominee “will work to improve procedures at the Department of Finance to ensure that assessments are conducted frequently, fairly and transparently,” his spokesperson said. [NYDN] — Mark Maurer