CT Tax men cometh too! BOOOOO!

[GrilledSteezeSandwich]

We're going up to 6.25% sales tax in MA from 5%.

pretty insignificant..I've been used to paying 6% here in PA my whole life..but I got spoiled with no sales tax in MT

 

[eastcoastpowderhound]

Yikes...that is a lot. VT only has a sales tax on passes, but it is not that high. NH here we come.... :wink:

just don't buy any property here in NH...my prop taxes here are nearly 400% higher than they were in maine...for a house that I bought for about 1/3rd more than the house I sold in Maine...the no income tax and no sales tax is made up for quite handily in the prop taxes. I'm essentially at the break even point on total taxes sent to the state/local for ME vs NH. The tax man gets it from you one way or another. "Drive you car and they'll tax the streets...ride your bike and they'll tax your seat..."

 

[Glenn]

just don't buy any property here in NH...my prop taxes here are nearly 400% higher than they were in maine...for a house that I bought for about 1/3rd more than the house I sold in Maine...the no income tax and no sales tax is made up for quite handily in the prop taxes. I'm essentially at the break even point on total taxes sent to the state/local for ME vs NH. The tax man gets it from you one way or another. "Drive you car and they'll tax the streets...ride your bike and they'll tax your seat..."

Thanks for absorbing the taxes. It allows me to run accross the VT boarder on the weekends and buy tax free beer and wine. It also reduces the low prices already in effect at the Hinsdale Wal-Mart. :beer:

 

[drjeff]

Thanks for absorbing the taxes. It allows me to run accross the VT boarder on the weekends and buy tax free beer and wine. It also reduces the low prices already in effect at the Hinsdale Wal-Mart. :beer:

The couple of times I've been in that Wal-mart I have to say that it's had a "cast of characters" in there that makes most Wal-mart's look normal

 

[Glenn]

The couple of times I've been in that Wal-mart I have to say that it's had a "cast of characters" in there that makes most Wal-mart's look normal

That's half the fun of going!

 

[drjeff]

That's half the fun of going!

Don't know what happens, but as soon as you cross that bridge out of Brattleboro you go from what tends to be very fit, ultra earthy "granola" folks to practically the 400lb beared lady sideshow freaks!

My guess is that all the cr@p food that the earthy/crunchy folks in Brattleboro DON'T eat gets thrown directly across the CT river and ends up in Hinsdale where it is instantaeously consumed my the Walmart "cast of characters"

 

[eastcoastpowderhound]

The couple of times I've been in that Wal-mart I have to say that it's had a "cast of characters" in there that makes most Wal-mart's look normal

we used to go to the Windham, ME Wal-Mart...now we go to the Epping, NH store...both are freaktastic venues for people watching. We were close to the N. Conway Wal-Mart but it wasn't anywhere near as high on the entertainment scale as Windham and Epping. Whenever my wife is having a bad self esteem day I tell her to take a trip to Wal-Mart...she comes back feeling much better about herself!

 

[eastcoastpowderhound]

Thanks for absorbing the taxes. It allows me to run accross the VT boarder on the weekends and buy tax free beer and wine. It also reduces the low prices already in effect at the Hinsdale Wal-Mart. :beer:

hey, don't mention it...just send me a check for $500 to reimburse me for my share of that friggin road you're driving on! Don't let me hear of anyone stopping at a NH rest stop either...you'll have to pay to pee!

 

[deadheadskier]

just don't buy any property here in NH...my prop taxes here are nearly 400% higher than they were in maine...for a house that I bought for about 1/3rd more than the house I sold in Maine...the no income tax and no sales tax is made up for quite handily in the prop taxes. I'm essentially at the break even point on total taxes sent to the state/local for ME vs NH. The tax man gets it from you one way or another. "Drive you car and they'll tax the streets...ride your bike and they'll tax your seat..."

A lot of that depends on where you are in Maine though. The difference between our town and property tax in Portland for instance is under $5 per $1000 or at least it was when were considering buying up there as opposed to down here. So compared to Portland if you make any sort of reasonably decent wage living where we do, it's considerably cheaper.

Where you were in Maine, the taxes sound damn cheap. For J and I the value of our place now is so low, property tax isn't that big of a deal, but in another year when we move into a bigger place, I'm sure I'll be feeling the pain much more.

You can escape it in Maine though as is apparent with what you had going up there. I'm unaware of a town in NH that has reasonable property taxes.

 

[Glenn]

hey, don't mention it...just send me a check for $500 to reimburse me for my share of that friggin road you're driving on! Don't let me hear of anyone stopping at a NH rest stop either...you'll have to pay to pee!

Give me a shout if you're in the Dummerston area. I can at least toss you a few cold, tax free beers from the fridge. :beer:

 

[eastcoastpowderhound]

A lot of that depends on where you are in Maine though. The difference between our town and property tax in Portland for instance is under $5 per $1000 or at least it was when were considering buying up there as opposed to down here. So compared to Portland if you make any sort of reasonably decent wage living where we do, it's considerably cheaper.

Where you were in Maine, the taxes sound damn cheap. For J and I the value of our place now is so low, property tax isn't that big of a deal, but in another year when we move into a bigger place, I'm sure I'll be feeling the pain much more.

You can escape it in Maine though as is apparent with what you had going up there. I'm unaware of a town in NH that has reasonable property taxes.

Comparing our town to portland isn't apples to apples....we're more like Buxton or Sanford in terms of population and rural/urban area. We used to live in Bridgton...same population as Newmarket..mostly rural with a small urban center...one major road going through town...ie 302 vs 108. Both towns have police and fire, a library,and a transfer station...but the transfer station in Bridgton is open 6 days a week vs 1 in newmarket. Granted we have curside pickup...but you pay $2.20per bag. We also lucked out a bit in bridgton...our taxes used to be over 3K up there and then the town did a revaluation...they went from a total valuation of ~400million to 600million but because our house was only a few years old our appraised value only increased by 30K and the mill rate went from $21 down to $11. The other piece is that ME seems to allow prop values to lag further behind current market values than NH or at least Newmarket does. In ME our new appraised value for taxes was 50K below what we sold the house for in a declining market, in newmarket out appriased value is right in line with what we paid for the house....and even though we wouldn't be able to sell it for what we paid you can guarantee that we won't see our valuation decrease this tax year...so we're now paying for a valuation that's higher than the market value. Look around before you buy a bigger house down here...Rye has a mill rate that's just over $9 per 1000 while newmarket, stratham, exeter and others are over $20. There are some towns in the mid teens. Think long term too, if you and J will have kids someday you'll want to make sure there's a good school system...we've got a great elementary school but the high school is in rough shape and may lose its accredidation because they don't meet the ADA act...they don't want to spend the money to put in an elevator or something like that. If you don't plan to have kids, find a town that doens't have a high school, offers minimal services, etc. We're happy where we are for now...may want to move when our daughter gets closer to middle school but who knows what will happen with the current school situation. Its natural to complain about taxes...that's how we ended up with our own country in the first place...otherwise we'd all be drinking tea and calling each other "govenah". :beer:

 

[eastcoastpowderhound]

Give me a shout if you're in the Dummerston area. I can at least toss you a few cold, tax free beers from the fridge. :beer:

if I ever make it out there I'll take you up on that beer!

 

[deadheadskier]

Comparing our town to portland isn't apples to apples....we're more like Buxton or Sanford in terms of population and rural/urban area. We used to live in Bridgton...same population as Newmarket..mostly rural with a small urban center...one major road going through town...ie 302 vs 108. Both towns have police and fire, a library,and a transfer station...but the transfer station in Bridgton is open 6 days a week vs 1 in newmarket. Granted we have curside pickup...but you pay $2.20per bag. We also lucked out a bit in bridgton...our taxes used to be over 3K up there and then the town did a revaluation...they went from a total valuation of ~400million to 600million but because our house was only a few years old our appraised value only increased by 30K and the mill rate went from $21 down to $11. The other piece is that ME seems to allow prop values to lag further behind current market values than NH or at least Newmarket does. In ME our new appraised value for taxes was 50K below what we sold the house for in a declining market, in newmarket out appriased value is right in line with what we paid for the house....and even though we wouldn't be able to sell it for what we paid you can guarantee that we won't see our valuation decrease this tax year...so we're now paying for a valuation that's higher than the market value. Look around before you buy a bigger house down here...Rye has a mill rate that's just over $9 per 1000 while newmarket, stratham, exeter and others are over $20. There are some towns in the mid teens. Think long term too, if you and J will have kids someday you'll want to make sure there's a good school system...we've got a great elementary school but the high school is in rough shape and may lose its accredidation because they don't meet the ADA act...they don't want to spend the money to put in an elevator or something like that. If you don't plan to have kids, find a town that doens't have a high school, offers minimal services, etc. We're happy where we are for now...may want to move when our daughter gets closer to middle school but who knows what will happen with the current school situation. Its natural to complain about taxes...that's how we ended up with our own country in the first place...otherwise we'd all be drinking tea and calling each other "govenah". :beer:

all very valid points. I guess the way I look at it is this, if you make 100K a year (I certainly don't, just a round number to work with), the State of Maine takes $8500 in income tax. Granted property taxes are in after tax dollars, but the whole 8.5% income tax is ridiculous to me, especially when the qualifier for the top bracket is something like 23k in income a year.

We'll see if we stick around Newmarket. The High School is indeed in rough shape.

 

[eastcoastpowderhound]

all very valid points. I guess the way I look at it is this, if you make 100K a year (I certainly don't, just a round number to work with), the State of Maine takes $8500 in income tax. Granted property taxes are in after tax dollars, but the whole 8.5% income tax is ridiculous to me, especially when the qualifier for the top bracket is something like 23k in income a year.

We'll see if we stick around Newmarket. The High School is indeed in rough shape.

Gotta admit, I do enjoy not paying the state every week or everytime I buy something...guess I was just trying to show that NH isn't the tax free haven most out of staters think it is...or the tax free haven the recruiter who got me here convinced me it was.