The Swartz Report: Impact of Bond Issues on Residential and Commercial Properties in Missouri

By Donald Swartz, President

April 8th was a significant day on the Missouri side of the Kansas City metro area as voters were asked to approve many bond issues in multiple cities, spanning Jackson, Platte and Clay Counties. While North Kansas City and Lee’s Summit Bond initiatives had no impact on the property tax levy, other cities planned to finance the bonds with mill levy increases.

Let’s look at a few areas more closely.

Kansas City

Voters approved a general obligation bond focusing on building new schools, major repairs to several existing schools and converting a closed former high school to a middle school. The impact of this bond passing will raise property taxes approximately $230/yr on residential appraised values of $200,000. Commercial properties, which have a higher assessment ratio in the calculation of property taxes, will raise property taxes on a similarly valued $200,000 property approximately $390/yr.

Independence

Three initiatives were brought forward to taxpayers, totaling just under $200MM. While two of the three initiatives failed, voters did approve the $55MM bond for the repair and rebuilding of certain city streets. This will have an impact of an additional $64/yr for residential properties valued at $150,000 and $108/yr for similarly valued commercial property. The median listing price for a residential property in Independence currently is $215,000 and the median sales price is $210,000.

Park Hill

The General Obligation Bond has two components, Proposition O and Proposition G. Both passed, raising $128MM. These bonds are school related, increasing teacher’s salaries and making necessary improvement to the schools in the district. Passing this initiative will increase the property taxes on a $300,000 residence by $228/yr and similarly valued commercial properties $384/yr.

In all situations, it is very important to recognize your situation. Do you own commercial or residential property in the areas identified above? Do you receive the assessment notices or are they issued to your mortgage company?

Bottom line, you need to be cognizant of your current appraised county value to determine your actual impact. 2025 is a reassessment year in Missouri and valuation notices will be issued in the upcoming weeks. The formal appeal deadline to contest your property tax values is July 14^th. Knowing the mill levy increases will occur later this year, now is the perfect time to review your property tax values to insure you are paying only your fair share.

Please reach out to me if we can be of assistance.