The Municipal Property Assessment Corporation (MPAC) was performing property value reassessments in Toronto last month, and given how quickly housing values have risen, some people are worried about a resulting property tax increase.

Michael Capotosto, president of the West Lansing Homeowners Association near Yonge and Sheppard, has seen the strain that an increasing tax burden can put on some residents, particularly those on a fixed income.  

“Next door to me, I have a woman in her 80s who lives in a bungalow, and her taxes have gone up exponentially since I’ve lived [in West Lansing],” said Capotosto.

“She consumes no more city services than anyone else. She actually consumes less because she has less garbage, lives by herself and has no children. She’s not alone, but she is a concrete example of how wrong the system is.”

 

The way property taxes work is often misunderstood. The city has to generate a specific amount of revenue to maintain services, such as road maintenance and garbage pickup, and property taxes are how they do it. It is revenue neutral, meaning the city doesn’t profit from it.

A tax increase only occurs if the property’s value increases more than the municipal average. Property taxes can actually decrease if the home’s value increases less than the average. If an increase occurs, it’s phased in over four years.

“Property owners will be able to see the first instalment reflected on the 2017 final property tax bill, which will be mailed in May 2017. A decrease in assessed value is introduced to taxpayers immediately,” Susan Pape, communications advisor with the City of Toronto, wrote in an email.

But some local residents might have something less appealing to think about. 

It’s one area of the city — north of Highway 401, west of Yonge Street and south of Sheppard Avenue West — that has seen significant property value increases over recent years — as much as 30 per cent, according to Ronit Barzilay, director of West Lansing Homeowners Association and a real estate agent.

“I have a lot of clients that are actually being forced to sell their homes because they can’t afford the taxes, the maintenance and the insurance on them because everything has gone up,” said Barzilay. “They’re on fixed incomes and have been living there for 20 or 30 years.”

If homeowners think the MPAC is overvaluing their home, they can log on to its new site AboutMyProperty.ca to file a request for reconsideration. 

They have a 60-day grace period after assessment to file. The process normally should take less than 180 days.