Does Maine Really Have the Highest Property Tax in the Country?

If you own property in Maine, you may be aware that your taxes are higher than the rest of the country, comparatively speaking. Unfortunately, this is nothing new, and has been a thing for a long time.

As tax season is upon us once again, it seems that the conversation never fails to come up. Mainers either get back a substantial less amount of money in their tax returns than they expected, or even worse, owe the state money.

WalletHub recently released their 2024 Tax Burden By State report, which confirms that not only does Maine carry the highest property tax burden in the country, but it also ranks #4 overall for tax burden on Mainers.

To come up with this data, WalletHub used the rates of property taxes, individual income taxes, as well as sales and excise taxes, and compared them up against all 50 states.

https://wallethub.com/edu/states-with-highest-lowest-tax-burden/20494

The data also revealed that taxes in Northern New England are a fair amount higher when stacked up against the rest of the country. WalletHub reported that Vermont is #2 and New Hampshire is #4 when it comes to property tax rates. However, New Hampshire ranks very low on the list for general tax burden, and that's likely due to the fact that the state does not require sales tax.

There are several possible reasons for Maine carrying such a high tax burden on residents, one of which is that we have a relatively small population spread out over a large area, which can increase the cost of providing services compared to more densely populated states.