Chicagoans Hit with 2025 Property Tax Bill Spikes Struggle to Pay
But Overall Countywide Tax Collections are Strong
Introduction
Many Chicago homeowners who received dramatic property tax bill increases in 2025 failed to pay their bills in full, causing residential collection rates to drop by 2% or more in seven community areas.
Particularly large residential collection drops occurred in the Riverdale Community Area, on the city’s far South Side, and in West Garfield Park, on the city’s West Side. In Riverdale, where total homeowner taxes increased by 65%, collections were down 11.1%, and in West Garfield Park, where homeowners were asked to pay more than twice as much as in 2024, collections were down 4.1%.
Although the percentage of billed taxes that were collected in more than a dozen South and West side communities was down, the total amount paid by homeowners in those areas was up, because the bills were so much higher in the first place and far more homeowners made partial payments — a sign they were trying, but struggling, to pay their bills in full.
In West Garfield Park, 15% of taxpayers made partial payments, an increase of nearly 54% over previous years. In 14 other community areas, partial residential payments topped 10%, compared to just one area where they exceeded that level a year earlier.
All of those areas have relatively low median household incomes, and in all but one of them, the residential collection rate declined as the partial payments increased. The biggest drops in collection rates occurred in census tracts where the median household income was below $50,000.
Dips in residential collections in those lower-income South and West side communities came as both city and countywide collections — measured 47 days after taxes were due on Dec. 15 — stood at 96.4%, a level in line with historical averages. 
Nevertheless, several south suburban cities and villages still had very low collection rates that imperil their overall finances and make it difficult to deliver adequate services, although the collections rates were somewhat improved from a year earlier. In the north suburbs, collection rates continued to be higher than elsewhere in the county.
Background
The Treasurer's Office bills and collects property taxes for 557 school districts, local governments and their subordinate agencies in Cook County. For the 2024 tax year, billed in 2025, those districts sought more than $19 billion from the owners of nearly 1.8 million properties.
Bills were mailed in two installments, the first in late January and due March 4, 2025, the second in November and due Dec. 15, 2025 — months later than normal due to troubles converting to the county’s new property tax computer system.
The office analyzed how much money was collected by Feb. 1, 2026 — 47 days after the second installment was due. It compared those collections to those from previous years at the same point in the collection cycle.
Countywide Collections climb
As of Feb. 1, 2026, the county had collected about 96.4% of the property taxes it billed in 2025. Taxpayers paid $18.4 billion of $19.1 billion billed.
That collection rate, reached about one-and-half months after taxes were due, is in line with prior years and higher than in 2024.
A long delay before second installment bills were mailed in 2025 likely made it easier for people to pay than it was the year before — when a record-short period between those bills led to a decline in initial collections — fueling the rebound to typical levels.
View the Data
Use the data dashboard to find collection rates for Cook County municipalities, Chicago wards and community areas, and county taxing agencies for the 2024 tax year 47 days after payments were due.
Collections By Property Type
Collection rates for all property types, except vacant land, improved in 2025. Residential collections in tax year 2024 improved by more than 1.4%, to 97.1%, the highest rate in three years.
Year-over-year collections on large multifamily, commercial and industrial buildings were up by less than 1%, but collection rates for those three types of property remained lower than they were two years earlier. Collections on vacant land dropped by 2.3%, to 68.5%, the lowest rate since the 2020 tax year billed in 2021.
By Assessment Region
In Chicago, the overall collection rate improved by 0.5% from the five-year low collection rate in 2024, with 96.4% of taxes paid. Collections, however, were lower than they were in tax years 2020 through 2022 at this point in the collection cycle.
The south suburbs had the highest overall collection-rate improvement, with payments increasing by 2%, to 94.2%, the highest level in at least 10 years. Despite the improvements, the south suburban collection rate remains the lowest among the assessment regions.
The north suburbs also saw an improved collection rate, increasing by just under 1% to 98.1%, the highest rate among the regions.
City of Chicago
The city of Chicago was reassessed for tax year 2024, shifting much of the tax burden from commercial properties to residential properties as taxes increased by 6.3%. Initial collection rates in the city were higher than in 2023, but slightly behind collection rates from 2015 to 2022.
The residential collection rate increased by more than 0.8% in the city, rising to 96.7%. Businesses, which comprise large multifamily, commercial and industrial properties, increased collection rates by 0.3% to 96.4%. Business collections in the city were still more than 1% lower than they were two years ago, when they reached 97.5% at the same point in the collection cycle.
Residential: A Tale of Two Cities
Residential collection rates improved or remained steady compared to the prior year in 63 of the city’s 77 community areas. Collection-rate declines were concentrated in low-income communities that saw large residential tax increases in 2025 — the result of higher residential assessments and lower commercial assessments —indicating that many homeowners in those neighborhoods are struggling to pay higher tax amounts.
The residential collection rate fell in 11 of the 13 community areas with the highest tax increases in 2024.
Riverdale, hit with a 66% increase in the amount billed to homeowners, had the largest collection rate falloff, dropping by 11.2% to 68.5%.
In West Garfield Park, where residential taxes more than doubled, the residential collection rate fell by 4.1%, to 82.8%. In both North Lawndale and Englewood, where homeowner taxes increased by more than 70%, collections declined more than 3%. West Englewood and Woodlawn were the only community areas to buck the trend. In West Englewood, taxes increased by 83.9%, but the collection rate rose by about 1.1%, to 83.4%.
West Englewood had a higher share of owner-occupied housing units than other communities with high tax increases, which may have contributed to a higher collection rate. In that community area, nearly 40% of homes were owner-occupied. The owner-occupancy rate was 21% or lower in every other community area with a residential tax increase of 50% or more.
In Woodlawn, where homeowner taxes rose 43%, the collection rate increased by 0.3%, to 91.4% — even though that community area had a home ownership rate of just 18.7%.
Collection rates increased most in community areas with smaller tax increases. For example, collections in the Lower West Side, which includes Pilsen, the homeowner collection rate increased by 4.2%, to 95.9% from 92%, as residential taxes increased by a relatively modest 3.9%.
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In communities with falling residential collection rates, an increased share of homeowners paid at least part of their total tax amount compared to last year.
In West Garfield Park, more than 15% of homeowners made partial payments on their 2024 taxes, up from just under 10% the year before. More than 10% of homeowners made partial payments in 14 community areas, compared to only one community area in tax year 2023.
Some homeowners who paid their first-installment bills in full may have then had problems paying their second-installment bills, which included the tax year 2024 increases. Many of those bills on the West and South sides increased dramatically from the previous year.
Lower-income areas were affected the most. Property taxes increased by more than 30% overall in the census tracts where the median household income was below $50,000. This income bracket was the only one to see falling collection rates in 2025.
Business Collections Still Below Normal
Despite a slight improvement from last year, early business property collection rates remained below historical norms in the city. The 96.4% collection rate was the second lowest in the last 10 years.
Collections for commercial properties — such as office buildings, retail stores, hotels and restaurants — were relatively flat, improving by just over 0.1% to 96.1%. For comparison, the commercial collection rate ranged from 97.3% to 97.8% at this point in the tax cycle from tax years 2015 to 2022.
Multifamily properties continued to be the property type with the highest collection rates in the city. Collection rates improved by a modest 0.4%, to 98.3%, in line with the typical rates at this point in the cycle.
Industrial properties showed greater collection rate improvements in 2025, increasing by 1.2% to 94.9%.
The collection rate on vacant land, historically the property type with the lowest collection rate, continued to lag, falling by 3.6% to 69.1%.
The South and Southwest Suburbs
Collection rates in the south assessment region, which encompasses Cook County’s south and southwest suburbs, improved significantly in 2025. Forty-seven days after taxes were due, the collection rate was 94.2%, nearly 2% higher than at the same point in the prior year.
Major Residential Collection Improvements
Leading the increase in overall tax collections in the south suburbs was a major improvement in residential collections. Homeowners paid 95.9% of their taxes, up 2.5% from one year earlier. The increase reversed notably low initial residential collection rates in the south suburbs in tax year 2023 — payable in 2024 — when homeowners in the region felt the pain of historic tax increases and grappled with a record-short period between that year’s second-installment bills and the previous year’s final bills. Including the first-installment bills mailed in 2024, three different tax bills came due in just an eight-month period.
Collection rates improved most in Ford Heights, where residential taxes rose by just 2%. The rate rose nearly 20%, to 46% — still the lowest collection rate in Cook County, but a clear improvement over two years ago, when the collection rate at the same point in the cycle was under 30%. In Dixmoor, the amount billed to homeowners dropped 2.3%, and the collection rate jumped to 74% from 66.8%, the second highest increase in the region.
While residential collection rates improved across all of the south suburbs, they increased the most in lower-income communities. Census tracts with a median household income below $50,000 paid 5.5% more of their taxes billed this year compared to the year before.
Those low-income areas had the steepest collection falloffs in 2024, when homeowner bills in -the lowest-income areas increased by 27%, so they also had the most room to rebound in 2025, when taxes across the region went up by less than 2%.
Commercial and Industrial Improvements, Multifamily Decline
The collection rates on commercial and industrial properties both improved by more than 1%, bringing those collections up to, or better than, historical norms.
The multifamily property collection rate dipped slightly, falling by less than half of 1%. Still, multifamily remains the property type with the highest collection rates in the south assessment region.
The collection rate on vacant land remained very low in the south, falling by more than 1% to 53.6%.
North
Collection rates in the north assessment region, which includes the north and northwest suburbs, improved by less than 1% compared to the same period last year. The region’s collection rate stood at 98.1% 47 days after taxes were due, the highest of the three county regions.
Residential Improvements
After two years of declining collections shortly after taxes were due, the residential collection rate increased by 1.3% in the north region. The collection rate now stands at 98.6%, the highest rate in the past five years.
Only one north suburban municipality, the small village of Golf, recorded a lower collection rate compared to the year before. The largest improvement in collection rates was in the section of Melrose Park that’s in the north region, with an increase of 6%, to 97.9%. Wheeling had the second highest improvement, increasing by 3.4%, to 98.8%.
Collection rates improved by 1% to 3% across all income brackets.
Business Collections Improve Slightly
Collections for multifamily, commercial and industrial properties improved by less than 1% from the same period last year.
The multifamily collection rate was nearly flat at 99%. Commercial collections improved by 0.6%, to 96.7%, after hitting a five-year low in 2024. In tax year 2022, the commercial collection rate was 98.2%. Industrial collections increased by 0.3% to 98.1%.
The collection rate on vacant land declined by 5.2%, to 89.1%, in 2025.
Looking Ahead
North Reassessments
The north assessment region is currently being reassessed for tax year 2025, to be billed in 2026. It’s still too early in the cycle to analyze how those reassessments will impact property taxes in that region.
When the northern suburbs were last reassessed, for tax year 2022, commercial values declined, and residential values increased, contributing to improved collection rates for businesses and lower collection rates for homeowners.
Due Date Volatility Continues
The initial overall collections ticked up in 2025, in part because taxpayers had more time to pay because second-installment bills were mailed months late. The reverse could be true if the second installment bills for 2026 are due by the Aug. 1 statutory deadline.
First installment bills mailed in 2026 are due April 1, just four months after the final bills in 2025. An on-time second installment bill for 2025 would mean taxpayers will have to pay three bills within 8 ½ months. When taxpayers had just eight months to pay in 2024, initial collections dropped, although they rebounded over time as late payments came in. Nevertheless, about 15,000 more taxpayers ended up paying the 9% annual interest rate on late payments.
In addition, an on-time second-installment bill would come more quickly than usual after the first installment is due, because the first-installment bill due date has been delayed to April, one month later than usual, to give people more time to pay.
Notes on the Data
About 8,600 second-installment bills for tax year 2024 had yet to be mailed as of late February 2026 due to the inability of a new county property tax system to calculate those bills properly. As a result, the total taxes actually billed in 2025 for tax year 2024 were about $142 million less than the total tax amount published in the Tax Year 2024 Bill Analysis and Statistics.
How those unsent bills might have affected overall collections is unknown, but they are likely to have only a marginal impact on collections, given that they account for less one-eighth of 1% of all taxes for tax year 2024. Nevertheless, the unsent bills should be considered when making cross-year comparisons.
The collection estimates in this report are not meant to reflect the final tax distribution to taxing agencies. They do not include back taxes, property taxes on railroads or property taxes on air pollution control facilities.
By Christopher Silber, Cook County Treasurer’s Office Research Team, Published: March 2026
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