Well, welcome to Oak Park. And congratulations on buying the loveliest home Oak Park has to offer. You bet. Yes, right here on North Kenilworth Avenue. Wednesday Journal Facebook fans became all agape and a-twitter when your lovely, sweeping, super-sized, yet understated, hydrangea bejeweled, Queen Anne Victorian, grey home was first listed.
And, you say, you negotiated the price down to just a shade over $2 mil. How very astute of you! Those savings off the asking price will likely come in handy going forward. You did notice the property taxes, now, didn’t you? Yep, you’re right, they were just a shade under $50,000 when you signed all those pesky papers at closing. You do know that property taxes come due every year, right? OK, good.
Wanted to mention to you that since you closed and before you moved in, Oak Parkers did go to the ballot box back in April and approved two property tax referendums for the elementary schools. That just might make a little upward ding on that $50,000 bill. Yes, most certainly, you’ll now be oh, at least a shade north of $50K.
But, you do have one of our mighty good elementary schools, Holmes School, right up the street from you. Yes, at Chicago Avenue. Most mornings you’ll hear the pitter patter of curious, bright and fully tax-infused little children as they make their way to school. And by a year from now, you’ll be getting the construction noise and dust from the expansion of Holmes School that your neighbors just voted for. You might need to schedule an extra washing for those gracious, tall windows. And, by the way, your neighbors all agree you need to invest in shades.
All the school board members at District 97, yes, those are the public elementary schools, appreciate you buying this house and paying the taxes. Do you have kids? No? Not yet? All the better. Pure profit, as educators like to joke.
But they did send me over — and sitting on this wraparound porch is just lovely. You have anything stronger than this lemonade? For you, I mean. I’m fine. Anywho, the school board wanted me to walk you through the pizza pie analysis that we traditionally like to trot out anytime we hike the old tax bill. Makes it more understandable, you see, when we compare the modest little tax increase to pizzas consumed.
No, not sure who first thought of it. But, yes, they were geniuses.
So let’s do the math. Say you were paying, oh, $48,000 annually in property taxes on this little shack. The D97 hike works out to, I’m told, about $74 more for every $1,000 in property taxes you are currently paying. So, 48 times $74 equals a puny $3,552 annual increase. Not so bad.
Now let’s do it in pizza math! Average pizza for two well-toned people like you might go for $20 a pie. Divide $20 into $3,552. Well, now, you’re going to be eating a lot of pizza. Did I mention we have some really award-winning pizza places in your new hometown. Seems you’ll be eating 3.41 pizzas per week. Maybe, Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and, sometimes, Saturday nights.
Just before I go, don’t want to let this slip my mind, and, everyone has to move in sometime, but just before you closed, all the property in Oak Park and River Forest got reassessed by those meanies down at the Cook County government. Happens every three years. Just possible your taxes could go up a smidge. Good news, it means your house is worth even more! Bad news is more pizza. Sometimes you’ll find a good coupon in Wednesday Journal.
