The average payment to successful Teton County refund applicants was the state’s highest at $4,666.

 

By Angus M. Thuermer Jr., WyoFile.com

Wyoming refunded $14.2 million in property taxes to state homeowners in 2024, about $6 million more than the statewide relief program doled out in 2023.

The Wyoming Department of Revenue recently reported the 2024 payment totals amounted to a 72% increase, according to WyoFile calculations.

In addition to the dollars refunded, the number of households receiving refunds also increased this year, jumping from 8,818 to 13,485. The 4,667 additional households that applied for and received property tax refunds this year amount to an uptick of about 52% compared to 2023, due in part to changes enacted by lawmakers.

Lawmakers should add $10.5 million to the refund program  through the state’s supplemental budget for next year’s operations, Department of Revenue Director Brenda Henson told the Legislature’s Joint Appropriations Committee last week.

The two-year budget for the program amounted to $20 million. The supplemental budget request would bring the account back up to $16.2 million for 2024 tax year refunds.

“I think there’s always been a need for property tax relief,” Henson, who served as a county assessor for 16 years, told the panel. “The property tax refund program is the only needs-based, income-tested relief program that’s on the books today.

“We believe that that additional $10.5 million will be sufficient to fund refunds for [tax year] 2024.”

The refunds distributed this year were for property taxes paid in 2023. To qualify for a refund, members of a household had to apply and show they met certain income, tax and asset requirements and limits.

The state program is separate from additional county tax refund programs available in 2024 in Albany, Converse, Lincoln, Sublette and Teton counties.

 

Teton tops another list

Among Wyoming’s 23 counties, Teton County got the largest share of state refund money this year, receiving $2.9 million. The 630 refunds in Teton County averaged $4,666.

Laramie County households received the second largest share of the funds — $2.2 million altogether. The 2,245 refunds, the largest county total, averaged $997.

Park County’s average refund at $1,178 was the second highest after Teton County’s. Those funds went to 1,645 successful applicants.

That Teton County — where staggering incomes and immense property values skew statistics — would receive the largest share of tax breaks raised questions from one lawmaker. Federal data shows the average per capita income for a Teton County resident was $471,751 last year, the highest in the nation.

“Teton County is the highest average dollar refund,” Sen. Jim Anderson, (R-Casper) said at the appropriations meeting. “I would think that wouldn’t be so if [the program] was income-related.”

The tax relief program is designed for home-owning residents, Anderson observed, not for absentee landlords or owners of rental properties — types of housing that may be more common in Teton County’s resort and tourist-heavy communities than in other parts of Wyoming.

“This has to do with owner-occupied houses,” Anderson said of the refund program. “I was thinking that would decrease the Teton County [refunds], but it’s four times what everybody else is.”

Property values drove the Teton figure up, Henson said.

“Obviously, fair market value of residential properties in Teton County is significantly higher” than other counties, she said. “So that’s why that refund amount is higher.”

Teton County’s assessed value for residential land, improvements and personal property amounted to $3.7 billion in 2024, Henson told the Joint Revenue Committee last month. That figure for the entire state amounted to $10.4 billion.

Teton County’s assessed residential value is more than three times the value in Laramie County, the next highest, which is $1.2 billion for 2024, according to Henson’s presentation. Yet Teton County has a population of 23,167 compared to Laramie County’s 101,187.

Residential value makes up 86% of Teton County’s total assessed value, according to Department of Revenue information. Statewide, counties’ residential value averages 32% of their overall assessed value, state information shows.

The supplemental budget will be debated when the Legislature convenes early next year.

WyoFile is an independent nonprofit news organization focused on Wyoming people, places and policy.