Open your proposed-tax statement this November and you'll see it again: another increase, bigger than your raise. You are not imagining it, and you deserve better than slogans about it. Here are the numbers from the Department of Revenue's own certification data, the documented reasons, and — because this site deals in fixes, not just complaints — the relief programs most Minnesotans don't know they're owed.
The numbers
Certified 2026 property tax levies statewide: $13.78 billion, up $873 million — 6.8 percent — over 2025. Cities up 7.7 percent, counties 7.6, schools 5.6. The local-government associations themselves — the League of Minnesota Cities, the county associations — told the House Taxes Committee this spring it was the largest increase since 2008. And it stacks: 2025's levies rose 5.6 percent, 2024's proposed increases ran 7.3.
The big jurisdictions tell the story. Minneapolis adopted +8.0 percent for 2026 — about $242 more in city tax on a median home — and Mayor Frey has already proposed +11.3 percent for 2027, the largest since at least 2000, alongside cutting a hundred city jobs. Hennepin County: +7.79 percent, a levy now over $1.13 billion. Ramsey County: proposed 9.75, landed at 8.25. St. Paul's school district jumped 14.9 percent — though that one, at least, was democracy in action: 65 percent of St. Paul voters approved the operating levy at the ballot box last November, choosing it over $37 million in cuts.
The documented drivers — it's not one villain
Washington moved costs downhill. County officials say federal reimbursements for administering SNAP and Medicaid shrank while new federal mandates added staffing requirements — the Association of Minnesota Counties' deputy director called the impact something "we have not seen in recent history," and one senator's tally puts the administrative cost shift to counties at $150 million a year. Pandemic-era federal aid is gone too; Minneapolis's borrowing nearly tripled in four years filling the hole.
Running a city costs more. Minneapolis's 2027 gap is driven by union contracts carrying 22–30 percent raises, police overtime that hit $33 million in 2025 (versus $4–6 million before 2020), and health-insurance inflation. St. Paul calculated that delivering the same services in 2026 as 2025 cost $23 million more. Ninety-eight Minnesota mayors signed a letter blaming unfunded state mandates and demanding relief. Every one of those pressures is real; every one deserves line-item scrutiny before it becomes your tax bill.
And here's the driver nobody explains at the podium: the empty office tower discount. Minnesota's system taxes commercial property at higher class rates — commercial and industrial property paid 25.5 percent of all Minnesota property taxes on just 11 percent of the market value. So when downtown collapses in value, the system automatically shifts the load onto houses. In Minneapolis, per a city council member's published analysis of the city's own data, commercial value fell 21.8 percent from 2019 to 2026 while residential value rose 23.1 percent — which is how the median homeowner faced an 11.8 percent tax increase in a year the levy rose 7.8. Your bill went up partly because a skyscraper's went down. Statewide, homestead values jumped 19 percent in the 2023 assessment alone, compounding the shift.
For perspective: the Minnesota Center for Fiscal Excellence's 50-state comparison puts Minneapolis 24th of 53 large cities on median-home property taxes — middle of the pack — but 13th on commercial, and rural Minnesota 6th. We are not an outlier on homes yet. The trend is what should worry us.
The relief you may already be owed
This is the section to forward to your neighbors, because the state's own research says eligible people routinely leave this money unclaimed:
- Homestead Credit Refund. If your property tax is high relative to income (limit: under $142,490), the state refunds part of it — nearly 495,000 homeowners got an average of about $1,129. New this year: a 2026 law boosted 2025 refunds by roughly 15 percent, applied automatically to timely filings.
- The "targeting refund" almost nobody knows exists. If your homestead's tax jumped more than 12 percent and $100 in one year, the state refunds 60 percent of the excess up to $1,000 — with no income limit. Only about 60,000 homeowners claim it; the House Research Department itself notes eligible taxpayers simply don't know about it. Given the increases above, check.
- Renters: the old renter's refund is now a refundable income-tax credit — up to $2,720, claimed right on your return (income under $77,570).
- Seniors 65+ (income ≤ $96,000) can cap payments at 3 percent of income and defer the rest as a low-interest state lien. Participation statewide: 405 people. That's not a program, that's a secret.
What we can do
First, claim what's yours — the programs above exist because homeowners already paid for them. Second, show up in December: every levy above was set at a public hearing most residents never attend; the gap between Ramsey County's proposed 9.75 and final 8.25 is what attendance buys. Third, demand the honest ledger from every level of government: if Washington shifts costs to counties, name the dollar figure in the levy resolution; if a mandate drives a levy, cite the mandate; if downtown's collapse is shifting burden to homeowners, publish the shift in plain numbers on the tax statement itself. Taxpayers will accept hard math. What corrodes trust is a bigger bill with no itemization — and no government, city, county, or state, should get away with that.
A property tax bill is the receipt for local government. Minnesotans deserve to see the itemization — every year, in plain English, before the vote.
Sources
MN Department of Revenue, Certified 2026 Property Tax Levies (updated Feb. 27, 2026) and Preliminary 2026 Levies release (Nov. 13, 2025); MN DOR preliminary-levy release for 2024 (Nov. 16, 2023); League of MN Cities/Association of MN Counties/MICA joint letter to the House Taxes Committee as reported by the Mesabi Tribune (Apr. 22, 2026); Star Tribune on the Minneapolis 2026 adoption (Dec. 9, 2025); AP on Mayor Frey's 2027 proposal (Aug. 12, 2026); City of Saint Paul budget release (Dec. 3, 2025); Hennepin County levy bulletin (Sept. 25, 2025) and KSTP (Dec. 2025); Ramsey County releases and Pioneer Press (Dec. 2025); MyVillager on the SPPS levy and the Nov. 4, 2025 referendum (Dec. 5, 2025); FOX 9 interviews with the League of MN Cities and Association of MN Counties (Nov. 19, 2025); the 98-mayors letter as reported Dec. 22, 2025; Council Member Conrad Zbikowski's published analysis of Minneapolis assessment data (Aug. 14, 2025); MN House Research, "Overview of Property Taxes" (Jan. 2025) — class-share, refund-participation, LGA, and program-parameter figures; MN DOR program pages for the homestead credit refund, renter's credit, and senior deferral (current parameters, incl. the 2026 refund boost); MCFE/Lincoln Institute 50-State Property Tax Comparison (July 2024) as summarized by House Research; Minn. Stat. §§ 275.70–.74 (levy-limit history, verified at revisor.mn.gov).
Where sources measure differently (DOR's 6.8% vs. the associations' 6.4%), each figure is attributed to its author. Corrections: campaign@madgettformn.com.