Finance Senator reassures: No massive increase in property tax is expected in Berlin.

Finance Senator reassures: No massive increase in property tax is expected in Berlin.

According to Finance Senator Stefan Evers (CDU), property tax in Berlin will not increase across the board. In a letter that will soon be made available to the Berlin tax offices and published on the website of the Senate Department of Finance, Evers assures property owners that massive increases are not to be expected. The new property tax value does not contain any information about the future amount of property tax, as this depends on other factors such as the tax assessment rate, which will be adjusted at the beginning of 2024. The tax figure has already been significantly reduced.

The property tax reform, which will come into force from 2025, may mean that the property tax to be paid can be both lower and higher than before. However, the Finance Senator emphasizes that the differences should be kept as small as possible and the goal is for the tax level to remain the same on average for all properties. If the property tax turns out to be disproportionately high in individual cases, it will be examined whether equitable measures are possible in order to avoid financial overtaxing.

The property tax reform became necessary due to a ruling by the Federal Constitutional Court in 2018, which declared the previous assessment procedure unconstitutional. In Berlin, the previous property tax was based on different valuation methods, which were never adjusted due to the division of the city and outdated property values ​​from 1935 in the east and 1964 in the west of Berlin.

According to a report from www.bz-berlin.de, 816,000 of the approximately 872,300 required declarations have already been received in Berlin, which corresponds to a share of 93 percent. Of these, around 731,700 were processed and property tax assessments were created.

Source: www.bz-berlin.de