Brookline property tax overview
- Ben Chostner
- Apr 17
- 2 min read
Updated: May 5
With the property tax override on the May 5th 2026 ballot I became curious about how property taxes work here in Brookline. I've also found that most discussions about property taxes ignore the impact of new property growth from renovation and new development.
I wanted to develop a first principles understanding of how it all works, the financial benefits of new growth, and importantly how new growth affects the taxes of an existing property owner (short answer: new growth can actual reduce taxes for everyone else in Town!)
The video also explains where each of the 2026 override calculators get their numbers, which are both slightly different from each other and both also ignore the benefit of new growth to an individual property owner.
Spreadsheet: FY27-FY29 Brookline property tax overview (feel free to make a copy)
Renovation & new development are great from a Town revenue perspective. By expanding the property tax base they grow revenue faster than they would otherwise, and this growth compounds over time.
Conclusions from the process:
Most discussion of property tax increases use a total Town view, not the view from an existing property
This overstates property tax increases for an existing property for 2 reasons:
it ignores that new property helps spread the cost of fixed dollar taxes, like overrides & debt exclusions, across more taxpayers
new property increases the Town tax collections, but does not increase taxes on an existing property
Town assumptions around future growth from development & renovation are VERY conservative
Brookline has averaged ~1.2% annual new growth, or ~$3.3M per year, over the last 5 years
Massachusetts cities have averaged growth of 1.8% per year over the last 5 years
Brookline forecasts only 0.8% annual new growth, or $2.5M per year, over the next 5 years
Increasing new growth to the state average, especially with commercial property, would generate significant revenue over time
