What to Expect When You’re Expecting a Property Tax Change

While property valuations have increased an average of 79% across the county, currently available data suggests that commercial owners and residents in more expensive areas may actually pay less tax.

This BCPI: Open Sources (BCPI.OS) article is written by Chris Fedor. BCPI.OS stories focus on delivering data-driven discoveries from publicly-available datasets.

At the end of February, many Durham homeowners received a letter from the Durham County Tax Administration containing the newly proposed valuation of their property, the result of a multi-year reappraisal process. State law mandates that such an evaluation occur at least every 8 years, and in 2022 the Durham County Commission voted to do so every 4 years moving forward. This process reappraises all properties to account for changes in the market, development potential, and physical changes to properties themselves.

The last such appraisal occurred in 2019. Due to the nationwide COVID-induced spikes in housing prices and more localized development interest in Durham, most valuations have increased significantly since 2019.

With the currently available data, outlined below, BCPI.OS has attempted to contextualize the sticker shock of that valuation relative to valuation changes county-wide.

The Currently Available Data:

79%: That is the county-wide average percent increase in property evaluation between 2024 and 2025 for likely tax-paying parcels that have been appraised so far.

Put another way, there are currently 120,242 parcels in Durham County with a 2025 value greater than $0 that could also be expected to be taxed (so notably, this excludes much of Duke University). Combined, those parcels have been valued this year at $72,856,909,736. Last year, that same set of parcels was valued at $40,662,569,044.

$1,998,554,334: That is the total 2024 value of the properties in Durham County that are currently valued at $0 (as of April 2). Not all properties in the county have been reappraised yet - generally these are commercial properties downtown and large apartments/condos. However, that should only amount to approximately 5% of the total county property value and would therefore have only a small impact on the total average percent value increase when complete.

1.3949%: That is the combined municipal + county tax rate in 2024. One’s total tax bill is calculated using their appraised property value and this combined tax rate. For the purpose of isolating the impact of the reassessment on one’s total tax bill—rather than the combined impact of the reassessment AND any increase/decrease in spending (BCPI.OS assumes here that this will be a revenue neutral reassessment). That is, the analysis assumes that as a result of the increase in valuation, the overall tax rate will decrease such that:

(2025 Tax Rate * 2025 Combined Property Value) = (2024 Tax Rate * 2024 Combined Property Value)

According to that equation, the increase in 2025 combined property value so far suggests that the final combined tax rate might come out to near .78%. Again, that depends on an overall budget roughly equal to the current one (around $652 million for the County and around $668 million for the City). That is… an assumption: either elected body could decide to pass any budget and adjust taxes as much as the majority would agree to.

Valuation appraisals do not themselves increase taxes or generate new funds—that authority lies only with our elected bodies—but rather appraisals simply seek to accurately assess changes in property values which would result in changes in the distribution of the tax burden across the collection of taxed parcels. The total collections should remain the same (unless changed by elected officials at budget adoption), but where those taxes are collected will change slightly: some will pay more, some will pay less.

Where Valuations Are Changing Fastest

With the data currently available and the assumptions outlined above, BCPI.OS projects that property owners who saw their property values increase by more than approximately 79% can also expect a net increase in their next total tax bill. Conversely, property owners who had less than an approximate 79% increase in valuation will likely pay less in net property taxes than they had in the previous year.

Visually, with current data, this analysis expects an increasing share of the tax burden to broadly fall on neighborhoods east of downtown. The average property owner in a neighborhood that is colored in purple or blue, like Trinity Park, Duke Forest, or Forest Hills, is more likely to see their overall property tax bill actually decrease next year. Someone living in a neighborhood highlighted in red or orange, such as Old East Durham or farther east in a subdivision, is more likely to see their total bill go up.

Above: Neighborhood median valuation changes. Based on the currently available data, the orange and red neighborhood parcel blocks can likely expect an increase in total tax bills. Blue and purple areas can likely expect similar or lower total tax bills. (Map created by BCPI.OS)

Above: Median neighborhood valuation change focused around downtown Durham. (Map created by BCPI.OS)

Biggest Gains, Smallest Gains

Below are calculated median statistics of valuation change by neighborhood and by land use type. These tables contain only neighborhoods that had at least 50 parcels and only land uses with at least 100 parcels of that land use type (or a combined value greater than $200 million). In each table, the top ten and bottom ten changes in percent terms are shown for each category.

At over a 150% increase, Old East Durham is the largest neighborhood with the largest median valuation change (Eastway Village is immediately adjacent). If the tax rate assumptions outlined above hold, that would translate to about a 40% increase in a typical tax bill. In Colony Park, the increase of 44.2% in value could translate to something like a 19% decrease in total tax bill.

Various types of “vacant” classified land use types saw the highest percent rates of increased valuation. The top one, “VAC RES/HOMEOWNERS”, contained nearly 2800 parcels which were valued at $1 each in 2024. In 2025, those are currently projected to be valued, on average, closer to $30,000 per parcel.

Conversely, various classifications of office and mixed use condo enjoyed the smallest valuation increases—and will likely pay less tax in real terms. As an example, if the future combined tax rate levied is indeed near approximately 0.8%, the owner of Liberty Warehouse Apartments will probably pay about $200,000 less in property taxes next year.

How to See Your Own

BCPI.OS accessed the parcel tax data used in this analysis from the Durham Open Data portal on April 2, 2025.

If you are interested in looking deeper, BCPI.OS is posting a public data file of parcel ID, site address, 2024 valuation, current 2025 valuation and a few additional metrics on percent changes in the linked Google Sheet below. There, one can search a parcel by address or ID to see how the valuation change stacks up to the county at large and if that property individually could be potentially preparing for either a tax increase or decrease.

BCPI Tax Predictor Lookup Tool