Property Tax in Franklin County, Massachusetts

What the Franklin County numbers mean

The median is the midpoint of the county's actual bills: half of Franklin County homeowners pay more than $4,595 a year and half pay less. The exact bill for any one home depends on its assessed value, exemptions, and which school, municipal and special districts cover it.

Set against the median home value of $303,400, the median bill works out to a derived effective rate of 1.51%. That rate is an estimate computed from the two medians — no county publishes a rate calculated this way — but it adjusts for home prices, which makes comparisons between counties more meaningful.

The key figures for Franklin County

For context, the Massachusetts medians are $5,813 of tax on $525,800 of value, and the US medians are $2,969 on $303,400. *Derived figures are estimates from Census medians, not official rates.

Franklin County at a glance

• Median tax rank in Massachusetts: #9 of 14 counties
• Median home value rank in Massachusetts: #12 of 14
• Population rank in Massachusetts: #12 of 14 (70,922 residents)
• Population density rank: #14 of 14 (101 people per square mile)
• Land area rank in Massachusetts: #4 of 14 (699 sq mi, 9.0% of the combined county land area)
• Median tax as a monthly figure: $383; per $1,000 of home value: $1.51

How Franklin County compares

Of the 14 Massachusetts counties with published data, 8 have a higher median property tax bill than Franklin County's $4,595, putting the county at #9 in the state. Its bill is about 21% lower than the state median of $5,813 and about 55% higher than the national median of $2,969.

Rates and values pull in opposite directions: an expensive housing market can produce big bills at ordinary rates. Here the derived rate is 1.51%, versus 0.98% derived nationally, and the median home value ranks #12 within Massachusetts.

Some extra context for Franklin County: the median bill works out to about $383 a month, and the derived rate equals roughly $1,515 of tax per $100,000 of home value. The county is home to 70,922 people — the #12 most populous county in Massachusetts, spread over 699 square miles, a density of about 101 people per square mile. Its median home value, $303,400, ranks #12 among the state's 14 counties with data.

Zooming out: of 3133 counties nationwide with published Census figures, only 151 record a higher median tax bill than Franklin County — it sits in the top 5% nationally. The county holds roughly 1.0% of Massachusetts's people. Its homes are worth less than the state norm (median $303,400 versus $525,800), and a decade at the derived rate of 1.51% adds up to about 15.15% of the median home's value in tax. The cheapest county in the state, Nantucket County, medians $2,985 — $1,610 less than Franklin County per year.

Counties nearest Franklin County in the Massachusetts ranking

Franklin County and its population peers

Counties of a similar size can tax very differently. The table below shows the counties closest to Franklin County in population across the United States, with their median bills and home values. Within the group of 9, Franklin County ($4,595) ranks the highest by median tax paid.

The closest population match is Greene County, Tennessee (70,919 residents), where the median real estate tax paid is $803 on a median home value of $186,400 — $3,792 more than Franklin County pays.

Staying within Massachusetts, the counties nearest Franklin County by population are Hampshire County (156,595 residents, median tax $5,326 on a median value of $363,400); Berkshire County (128,047 residents, median tax $3,891 on a median value of $283,800); Dukes County (20,751 residents, median tax $5,503 on a median value of $1,104,100); Nantucket County (14,299 residents, median tax $2,985 on a median value of $1,387,000). The spread in their median bills — all under the same state framework — shows how much of the property tax burden is decided county by county and district by district.

How the tax is worked out

As an illustration of the arithmetic: at Franklin County's derived rate of 1.51%, a home valued at $400,000 would carry a tax bill of roughly $6,060 a year. That is only an illustration using the derived rate — a real bill is computed from the property's assessed value, its exemptions, and the combined rates of its specific taxing districts, so it can be higher or lower.

The usual sequence is: the local assessor values the property; exemptions are applied; the taxable value is multiplied by the combined local rates; and the county bills and collects the tax, distributing it to the schools, municipalities and districts that levied it.

Illustrative bills in Franklin County at the derived rate

The derived rate of 1.51% is only an estimate built from medians, but applying it to different home values gives a sense of scale for Franklin County — and a quick way to compare with the state derived rate of 1.11% and the US figure of 0.98%:

Illustration only: real bills are computed from the assessed value, exemptions, and the combined rates of the property's actual taxing districts.

Checking your assessment in Franklin County

Most successful appeals are won on facts, not arguments. Start with the property record card held by the Franklin County assessor: wrong square footage, an extra room, or a missing homestead exemption are common and fixable. Next, line your assessed value up against recent sales of genuinely similar homes nearby. Many disputes end at an informal conversation with the assessor's office; if yours does not, file the formal appeal with the review board named on your notice before its deadline, evidence attached, and keep paying the bill in the meantime so penalties do not build up.

More Massachusetts counties

• Dukes County, MA — $5,503
• Nantucket County, MA — $2,985
• Berkshire County, MA — $3,891
• Hampshire County, MA — $5,326
• Barnstable County, MA — $4,090
• Hampden County, MA — $4,332

Frequently asked questions