DeKalb County residents face an April 2 deadline to claim their Homestead Exemption, an opportunity for significant savings on their property tax bills. Even though Tucker is an incorporated City within DeKalb and has a zero-millage rate, Tucker homeowners can still apply for the Homestead Exemption, if they haven’t already in the past.
Sheri Boritz from the DeKalb Tax Commissioner’s Office took time to address some frequently asked questions about the Homestead Exemption.
Q: What is the Homestead Exemption?
A: It’s actually something that everyone who owns and resides at their house is entitled to have. It usually saves the homeowner about a third of the annual taxes and all they have to do is fill out a one-page form, which can be done on our website. Your car tags have to be registered there and you have to file income taxes from that property. Other than that, you get to have that savings for as long as you own and reside at that house.
Q: How are owners of multiple properties affected?
A: If you own multiple properties, you can only live in one. So that’s the one that you have a homestead in. Any other properties that you have, whether they be rental properties or business properties, would not be entitled to the savings.
Q: How do you apply for a Homestead Exemption?
A: The easiest thing to do is go to our website, which is dekalbtax.org and you can fill out the form online. You’ll get a confirmation email within about 30 seconds. You’ll see the savings at first on your assessment notice when it comes out in June and then again when the tax bill comes out in August.
Q: Does the Homestead Exemption apply to residents in the City of Tucker even though the City has a zero-millage rate?
A: A Homestead Exemption is built into the legislation that created the City. It works the same way as the County exemption. Right now, we are processing all of those City exemptions in conjunction with the County exemption. If you already had a County exemption when Tucker got created, we’re going ahead and automatically applying the Tucker exemption. So, there’s nothing anybody has to do.
