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If you want the lowest property taxes while getting the best bang for your tax dollars in the region, move to Sullivan County, according to a new analysis from the website smartasset.com.
				The site calculated and &ldquo;effective average&rdquo; property tax rate for all 67 of Pennsylvania&rsquo;s counties, and in fact for most counties in the nation. To get a number they feel is comparable among counties, the site divided the median property tax of a county by the median home value. The lower the number, the lower the tax rate compared to other counties.
				The state-wide average came to 1.58%. Luzerne County fell just barely above that, at 1.59%,which is lower than four neighboring counties. Lackawanna came in at 1.6%. Monroe was the highest at 2.47%. Carbon was 1.85% and Schuylkill was 1.61%.
				Wyoming County was lower than Luzerne at 1.44% and Columbia County beat that at 1.15%. But only Sullivan County got below a single digit, coming in at 0.92%. That not only makes it the lowest among neighboring counties, it makes it the second lowest in the state. Only Bedford County had a lower rate, and not by much: 0.9%.
				The website did a more complicated calculation to try to determine &ldquo;where people are getting the most value for their property tax dollars.&rdquo;
				The first part of that math was to calculate a per capita property tax collected for each county, using the number of households, median home value and average property tax rate.
				The second part: to gauge the quality of schools &mdash; the biggest consumer of property tax dollars &mdash; using state standardized test results in math and English Language Arts (what used to be called more simply &ldquo;reading&rdquo;).
				And the final piece of the equation calculated the change in property tax value in each county over five years, expecting that &ldquo;property values that rose by the greatest amount indicated where consumers were motivated to buy homes, and a positive return on investment for homeowners in the community.&rdquo;
				The site combines those three data points into a single ranking for each county. Here, Sullivan County again did best among Luzerne and its neighbors, ranking third in the state. Columbia ranked 11th, but the remaining counties were among the bottom 20, with Luzerne at 56th and Lackawanna at 58th. Monroe, with the highest effective average tax rate, was 66th.
				With 67 counties, that should mean one ranked lower, but the interactive map on the website, <a href="https://smartasset.com/taxes/pennsylvania-property-tax-calculator#pennsylvania" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">smartasset.com</a>, doesn&rsquo;t give data or a ranking when the cursor is placed over Cameron County.
				On the other hand, if you want to live in the county where property owners get the best value for their tax dollars, you don&rsquo;t need to move too far. Montour County ranked number 1 in the state, and that&rsquo;s immediately west of Columbia County.

Study: ‘Effective’ property tax for Luzerne County same as state average