Property tax reform
Following a ruling by the Federal Constitutional Court, the federal government and the federal states have revised the calculation of property tax. The reform came into force on January 1, 2025.
For the majority of property owners (around 61% of all properties), property tax will become cheaper from 2025 - but for around 39%, it will become significantly more expensive in some cases!
You can calculate the amount of property tax you will have to pay each year by multiplying your individual tax assessment amount by the new assessment rate of 1230 points for the city of Offenbach. Then divide the result by 100. This sum corresponds to the annual amount payable in euros.
Please note: The property tax is usually debited four times a year (quarterly).
Further details and a list of questions and answers can be found on this page.
Info event
The City of Offenbach informed around 130 interested property owners about the property tax reform and the future new assessment rate. You can view the presentation from the evening on this page.
Current status
As the owner, you must have already received your new property tax assessment amount from the tax office. The tax office also transmits all new tax assessment amounts electronically to the City of Offenbach. The tax department of the municipal treasury must check these and clarify any ambiguities with the tax office.
Not all data had been transmitted to the city by mid-December 2024. Therefore, the final new assessment rate could not be calculated until January 2025.
The City of Offenbach will send out the new property tax assessment notices in April 2025. Payment for the first quarter of 2025 (January to March) will be made in May together with the regular due date for the second quarter of 2025 (April to June).
New assessment rate
Due to the considerable changes to the tax assessment amounts in some cases, it is necessary for almost all municipalities to change their assessment rate. The reform should be "revenue-neutral", i.e. the local authorities should neither generate less nor more revenue from property tax than before. This means that the revenue from property tax will remain the same for the city.
The Hessian tax authorities have calculated for all municipalities in Hesse what assessment rate would be necessary for the municipalities to generate the same income from property tax as before the reform. For the city of Offenbach, an assessment rate of at least 1,201 points (previously: 895 points) would be required to achieve total revenue of €46 million, as in 2024 (the year before the reform). Compared to the Hessian tax authorities, the City of Offenbach used the most up-to-date figures for the exact calculation of the assessment rate. This data resulted in the revenue-neutral assessment rate of 1230 points. The final and legally binding determination of the calculated assessment rate is expected to be adopted by the city council on March 20.
