WESTFORD — The Select Board on Tuesday set the FY25 tax rate, which could see residential tax bills increase by $313 for the average single-family homeowner.
The Select Board voted unanimously to approve a single tax rate of $13.47 per $1,000 in property value, a $0.30 decrease from last year.
The board continued its trend of maintaining a single tax rate within Westford to maintain a “balanced community that is welcoming both to business, small business and residents.”
“If you reduce each resident a small amount, to make up the tax levy you have to raise the commercial payer a relatively much larger amount,” Select Board Vice chairman Thomas Clay said, referring to a report from the new-defunct 2018 Tax Classification Research Group. “To give any real relief to the residents, you are putting an extremely disproportionate burden onto the CIP payers.”
As WestfordCAT reported last year, the average tax bill for a single-family home assessed at $756,500 was $10,417 in 2024. For FY25, the average single-family home valued at $796,600 would be taxed $10,730 under the new rate.
Townwide residential property value jumped 6.2% – from approximately $6.04 billion to approximately $6.42 billion encompassing 6,510 single-family homes and 1,478 residential condominiums among 8,668 total parcels. Residential properties have accounted for 97.2% of net new taxable properties among 37 residential, commercial, and industrial parcels.
On a macro level, townwide property value among all categories jumped by 5.5% – from approximately $6.7 billion to approximately $7.1 billion.
