Virginia Property Tax Calculator (Assessed Value & Millage Rates)

Ranked #30 out of 50 states at an average effective rate of 0.71%, Virginia lands below the national median. Nationally, the average effective rate runs close to 1.0%, which puts Virginia noticeably below the national average of roughly 1.0%. That's below the South regional average of about 0.79%.

As in most of the South, property tax revenue in Virginia funds local school districts, county services, and municipal budgets rather than flowing through a state-level general fund, so the rate is effectively set locally even though the average is reported statewide.

Because assessment and appeal procedures in Virginia are administered locally rather than by a single statewide office, the exact timeline for a reassessment or an appeal can vary by county. The sections below outline the exemptions and appeal windows generally available to owners who want to contest a valuation.

Virginia has no state property tax and gives its cities and counties near-total control, including how often they reassess. Rates are quoted per $100 of assessed value and assessment is at 100% of fair market value, so a Virginia rate is directly comparable across localities in a way most states' are not.

None of that detail is asked for here. This calculator works one level up, applying Virginia's average effective property tax rate of 0.71% to the value you enter. That rate is the ratio of property taxes actually paid to home value across the state, so the assessment ratios, caps, and exemptions described above are already baked into it.

Two of the five steps below are what the engine performs. Steps 3 and 4 are the calculation; steps 1, 2 and 5 describe the county process the effective rate is an average of, and no input on this page collects any of it:

1. Start from fair market value. Localities assess at full value, on annual, biennial, or longer cycles depending on the jurisdiction.
2. Take off relief. Localities run their own tax relief programs for elderly and disabled owners, and land use assessment values qualifying farm and forest land on use rather than market.
3. Multiply by the effective rate. At 0.71%, a $400,000 home in Virginia comes to $2,840 a year before any exemption you enter above.
4. Divide by twelve for escrow. That same home works out to $236.67 a month set aside in a mortgage escrow account.
5. Compare it against your own bill. Virginia also taxes personal property such as vehicles, which is a separate bill from the real estate tax modeled here. Your county's number is the one that governs; this figure tells you whether it is roughly where a Virginia home of that value ought to land.

Using this calculator's baseline inputs: a $400,000 home in Virginia, taxed at the state's 0.71% average effective rate (rank #30 of 50 states).

1. Start with the assessed value. The home is assessed at its full $400,000.00 market value, with no homestead exemption applied in this baseline scenario.
2. Apply the effective rate. $400,000.00 × 0.71% = $2,840.00 in annual property tax, Virginia's statewide average effective rate.
3. Convert to a monthly escrow. Lenders typically collect property tax in twelve equal installments alongside principal and interest: $2,840.00 ÷ 12 = $236.67 per month.
4. Project a five-year hold. At a flat rate, five years of ownership totals $2,840.00 × 5 = $14,200.00, before any reassessment, exemption change, or millage increase.

At 0.71%, Virginia lands roughly in the middle nationally, ranking #30 of 50 states. That is a moderate but still material carrying cost for homeowners.

The marginal cost of the next $10,000 of value. Moving the entered value from $400,000 to $410,000 moves the annual bill from $2,840.00 to $2,911.00. Every additional $10,000 of Virginia value costs $71.00 a year, or $5.92 a month in escrow, and it costs exactly that at every point in the sweep because the engine applies one rate to the whole value with no bands, no floor and no cap.

The sweep, end to end. The twelve-row table walks the entered value in sixths, from one sixth to twice it. At the first row, $66,666.67 of value, the bill is $473.33. At row six, the $400,000 default, it is $2,840.00. At row twelve, $800,000, it is $5,680.00, or $473.33 a month. Doubling the value doubles the tax to the cent, which is the clearest possible statement of what this calculator is: an effective-rate multiplication, not a millage computation.

The reverse question. A buyer with a fixed monthly escrow budget can read the sweep backwards. $236.67 a month supports a $400,000 assessment at 0.71%; $473.33 a month supports $800,000. To pay no more than $3,550.00 a year, the value has to stay at or under $500,000, which the engine confirms directly: $500,000 returns $3,550.00.

Right method against wrong method, priced. Enter a $25,000 homestead exemption and the headline falls from $2,840.00 to $2,662.50, a saving of $177.50. Now read the schedule underneath it: row six still shows $2,840.00. That is not a display bug, it is what the code does. The exemption is subtracted from the value before the headline is computed, but the twelve-row sweep is built from the entered value with the exemption never applied, so every row of the table is the no-exemption figure. Sizing a purchase off the table while quoting the headline double-counts nothing and single-counts wrongly: at a $50,000 exemption the headline is $2,485.00 and the gap to the table widens to $355.00.

What the effective rate is a ratio of, and what it is not. The 0.71% figure is total Virginia property tax actually paid divided by market value, taken across the state. It is not a millage rate and it is not a rate to apply to a locally assessed figure. Virginia localities assess at full market value, so the two figures usually coincide here, but a locality mid-cycle carries a stale listing and entering it moves the answer by the whole staleness: $500,000 of value returns $3,550.00 against the $2,840.00 a $400,000 listing returns.

The one number on this page that carries no arithmetic. The national rank of 30th is read straight out of the same table as the rate and is not computed from the value entered. It does not move anywhere in the sweep, and it will read the same at $66,666.67 of value as at $800,000.

• The homestead exemption is applied to the headline only. The twelve-row schedule is built from the entered value with no exemption subtracted, so at a $25,000 exemption the table reads $2,840.00 at the default row while the headline reads $2,662.50.
• There is no threshold anywhere in this calculation. No band, no cliff, no cap and no phase-out exists in the code path, so no value in the sweep produces a step change in the rate.
• Specific hyper-local county and municipal millage district variations within Virginia.
• Community Development Authority (CDA) assessments. Master-planned developments in Virginia, including projects in Chesterfield, Fairfax, and Stafford counties, can sit inside a CDA that levies a special assessment or tax on property owners to repay bonds for roads and other infrastructure, layered on top of the base county millage.
• Commercial vs residential assessment classification differentials.
• Property tax appeal reductions or localized board of equalization adjustments.

• Confusing Market Fair Value with Assessed Basis: Some jurisdictions assess property at fractional ratios rather than 100% of market value.
• Failing to File Homestead Paperwork: Homestead exemptions are rarely automatic; homeowners must file timely paperwork with the county appraisal district.
• Underestimating Post-Sale Supplemental Assessments: Purchasing a newly constructed or reassessed property often triggers catch-up supplemental tax bills.
• Ignoring Property Tax Appeal Windows: Missing the annual 30-to-60 day statutory protest window forfeits the right to challenge over-assessed property values for that tax year.

• U.S. Census Bureau: American Community Survey (ACS) Real Estate Assessment Benchmark Data. census.gov/programs-surveys/acs
• Virginia Department of Taxation: Property Tax Assessment Guidance. tax.virginia.gov