High on taxes

From Forbes:

America’s Priciest Property Taxes

After navigating a tight credit market and securing a home loan, a big property tax bill really hurts.

And nowhere is it felt more than in New York and New Jersey, where residents pay more in these taxes than anyone else in the country. The hardest hit? Homeowners in western New Jersey’s Hunterdon County. Last year, the median yearly property tax bill amounted to a whopping $7,999 here, according to the Tax Foundation, a nonpartisan research group in Washington, D.C, which compiled data based on 2006 figures.

Things aren’t much better in New York. In Nassau County, Long Island, the median homeowner drops $7,706 a year, while up north, Westchester County residents pay $7,626 a year.

In fact, New York and New Jersey residents can expect to pay up to $6,500 more in yearly property taxes than the national average. The reason: The region’s homes are among the priciest in the country, and tax rates there are high as well.

“They spend more on government [in the Northeast],” says Gerald Prante, an economist at the Tax Foundation. “In New York and New Jersey, they’re high on every tax.”