Property Tax in Sherburne County, Minnesota

What the Sherburne County numbers mean

The median is the midpoint of the county's actual bills: half of Sherburne County homeowners pay more than $3,311 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 $332,700, the median bill works out to a derived effective rate of 0.99%. 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 Sherburne County

For context, the Minnesota medians are $3,184 of tax on $305,500 of value, and the US medians are $2,969 on $303,400. *Derived figures are estimates from Census medians, not official rates.

Sherburne County at a glance

• Median tax rank in Minnesota: #10 of 87 counties
• Median home value rank in Minnesota: #7 of 87
• Population rank in Minnesota: #12 of 87 (99,178 residents)
• Population density rank: #9 of 87 (229 people per square mile)
• Land area rank in Minnesota: #77 of 87 (432 sq mi, 0.5% of the combined county land area)
• Median tax as a monthly figure: $276; per $1,000 of home value: $0.99

How Sherburne County compares

The median tax bill in Sherburne County is about 4% higher than the state median ($3,184 for Minnesota) and about 12% higher than the US median ($2,969 nationally). By median taxes paid, the county ranks #10 out of 87 Minnesota counties with published Census data — 9 counties in the state have a higher median bill.

Comparisons cut both ways: a county can have a modest rate but high bills because homes are expensive, or a high rate but modest bills because homes are cheaper. Sherburne County's derived rate of 0.99% sits above the derived US figure of 0.98%.

Some extra context for Sherburne County: the median bill works out to about $276 a month, and the derived rate equals roughly $995 of tax per $100,000 of home value. The county is home to 99,178 people — the #12 most populous county in Minnesota, spread over 432 square miles, a density of about 229 people per square mile. Its median home value, $332,700, ranks #7 among the state's 87 counties with data.

Nationally, Sherburne County's median bill of $3,311 ranks #368 of 3133 counties with published data — inside the top 12% of counties by tax paid. The county accounts for about 1.7% of Minnesota's population, its median home value is about 9% above the state median, and at the derived rate the median home would hand over roughly 9.95% of its value in tax across a decade. Within the state, the distance from Sherburne County to the most expensive county, Carver County ($4,380), is $1,069 a year.

Counties nearest Sherburne County in the Minnesota ranking

Sherburne County and its population peers

Counties of a similar size can tax very differently. The table below shows the counties closest to Sherburne County in population across the United States, with their median bills and home values. Within the group of 9, Sherburne County ($3,311) ranks the highest by median tax paid.

The closest population match is Montgomery County, Virginia (99,159 residents), where the median real estate tax paid is $2,174 on a median home value of $283,600 — $1,137 more than Sherburne County pays.

Staying within Minnesota, the counties nearest Sherburne County by population are Wright County (145,270 residents, median tax $3,319 on a median value of $332,800); Carver County (108,622 residents, median tax $4,380 on a median value of $426,900); Blue Earth County (69,386 residents, median tax $2,487 on a median value of $252,800); Rice County (67,389 residents, median tax $2,899 on a median value of $298,500). 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 Sherburne County's derived rate of 0.99%, a home valued at $400,000 would carry a tax bill of roughly $3,980 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 Sherburne County at the derived rate

The derived rate of 0.99% is only an estimate built from medians, but applying it to different home values gives a sense of scale for Sherburne County — and a quick way to compare with the state derived rate of 1.04% 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 Sherburne County

Believe your assessment is too high? The practical order of attack is: obtain your record card and audit it line by line; collect comparable recent sales in Sherburne County; ask the assessor's office to correct anything plainly wrong; and, if the value still seems off, lodge a formal appeal ahead of the deadline printed on your assessment notice. Windows are short — often 30 to 90 days — and late appeals are usually rejected outright, however strong the case.

More Minnesota counties

• Carver County, MN — $4,380
• Blue Earth County, MN — $2,487
• Rice County, MN — $2,899
• Crow Wing County, MN — $2,161
• Clay County, MN — $2,854
• Otter Tail County, MN — $1,966

Frequently asked questions