NEPTUNE TOWNSHIP - In case you missed it, the quarterly tax bill is due Friday, 8/1/25. And some increases have residents speaking out on social media.
Earlier this week, the Neptune Township Committee released a statement calling on the State of New Jersey to restore lost school funding to keep taxes lower for residents, with Mayor Robert Lane stating, "Our municipal government has worked diligently to keep local taxes stable. The Township’s portion of the increase is just $621,373—about 3.5%—and municipal taxes have only increased 1.8% over last year. For more than fifteen years, Neptune Township has managed its municipal finances responsibly. Yet we are now witnessing a crisis driven not by local mismanagement, but by state-level decisions that have decimated school funding.”
On Next Door and Facebook, residents have taken to discussing this complex issue in online forums. One neighbor states, “Has everyone received their property tax bills from Neptune Township and discovered that the tax rate has increased an absurd 5+ percent over last year!” As TAPinto Neptune reported, Neptune Township is ranked as 14th highest tax increase in the state in 2024, prior to this increase. Additionally, New Jersey has the highest property taxes in the United States.
Another resident offered practical advice, stating,
Taxes are based on assessment. Assessment up, taxes up. The value of your home keeps appreciating. You can probably sell your home now for quite a bit more than you paid for it, especially if you bought it in the 20th century. If NJ taxes become unbearable and/or you simply do not need such a big home anymore, take the money and run! Downsize to a house in a low-tax state. One more thing that might help you if you remain in NJ is the increase in SALT deduction. When you itemize deductions on IRS form Schedule A, numbers 5 to 7, you list taxes that you paid for State and Local Taxes. The limit for SALT was $10,000. but is now $40,000. So, maybe you are a senior now and have no children attending local schools. Or, maybe you never had children attending public schools. Instead of thinking how unfair that you are paying so much in taxes when 58% is going to schools, consider that you are doing good to help others. You are educating children who will contribute to society. Schedule A, lines 11 to 14 is for gifts to charity. Think of the property taxes you list on lines 5 to 7 like gifts to charity. One may donate to worthy charities like Doctors Without Borders to save lives in faraway places. By paying your local property taxes, you are saving lives in your community.
Property tax is determined by multiplying the total tax rate (1.808 for 2025) by your home's assessed value. Residents are able to contest their assessed value via the County tax assessor's office.
Some residents have also expressed concern, on social media and in emails sent to TAPinto Neptune, that one cause of the continuing increases may be the annual assessment conducted on the value of Neptune Township property, the Assessment Demonstration Program (ADP). This program, the result of a bill signed into law in 2013, is unique to several towns in Monmouth County. The Monmouth County government website states, "While there are several components of the Assessment Demonstration Program, the overarching goal is to annually provide more accurate and uniform property assessments for fairer distribution of the annual property tax levy." Proponents of the ADP said at the time of its inception that it was beneficial in that properties had previously been being undervalued and thus under-taxed.
This program was formally established as a five-year pilot program beginning in 2015. Previous to 2015, Monmouth County's 400,000+ property owners saw new appraisals every several years in a timeframe set by the municipal governing body. Under ADP, Monmouth County taxpayers in specific municipalities see the assessed value of their properties change each year based on "market conditions." Once every five years, a physical assessment is conducted by a contracted property examination company which is retained by the municipality.
This has led to some critics of the ADP decrying it as unfair; claiming that assessments that are not conducted physically but change each year based on the market price of comparable homes that are sold in one's area make it impossible for the assessments to be accurate. ADP has also been the subject of court proceedings; a case was brought to court resulting from ADP's lack of protection for those who appeal their assessments. In 2021, a New Jersey Tax Court Judge found that there is no evidence that ADP results in properties being assessed at true market value.
ADP also impacts school districts. Under the current formula for state aid to public schools, the Department of Education takes the overall property values of a municipality into account when determining aid amounts. The higher the property values, the higher potential that a school district may receive less aid.
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