Two offices, one bill
Property taxes in Arizona are a county job, split between two elected officers. The County Assessor decides what every parcel is worth for tax purposes. The County Treasurer takes the rates every taxing district has adopted, applies them to those values, mails one consolidated bill and hands the money out. In between, the Board of Supervisors formally adopts the levies each August. The county officers guide covers who holds each office.
Neither office decides how much you owe. The amount comes from the rates set by the governments whose boundaries your parcel sits inside: the county, your city, your school district, the community college district and a handful of special districts.
How your home is valued
The Assessor gives every property two numbers. Full cash value is an estimate of market value. Limited property value is the one that matters: under Prop 117, which voters passed in 2012 and which took effect in 2015, it can rise no more than 5 percent a year and can never exceed full cash value. Every property tax is charged on it.
A home’s assessed value is 10 percent of its limited value. Rates are quoted per $100 of assessed value, so a home with a limited value of $500,000 has an assessed value of $50,000 and pays each rate 500 times.
What’s on a Scottsdale bill
For a home inside the city and in Scottsdale Unified, the county’s 2026 rates add up to about $6.91 per $100 of assessed value before the state’s homeowner rebate. The pieces:
- Scottsdale Unified School District: about $3.12, the biggest share by far
- Maricopa County: about $1.15
- Maricopa County Community College District: about $1.10
- City of Scottsdale: about 90 cents, a primary levy plus a secondary levy for voter-approved bonds
- Special districts: the county hospital district (Valleywise Health), the Flood Control District, the Central Arizona Water Conservation District, which runs the CAP canal, the EVIT career-tech district, the Library District and the Fire District Assistance Tax, together about 65 cents
On that $500,000 example, the gross bill is about $3,457, of which the city gets about $449. The city budget guide explains why Scottsdale relies on sales tax instead.
Primary and secondary
Every line on the bill is either primary or secondary. Primary taxes pay for the day-to-day operations of the county, cities, school districts and community colleges. The Arizona constitution limits them two ways: each county’s and city’s primary levy can grow only about 2 percent a year plus new construction, and primary taxes on a home can’t exceed 1 percent of its value. When the combined primary rate would break that 1 percent cap, the state covers the difference through the school district.
Secondary taxes fall outside those limits because voters or the legislature approved them separately: bonds for city streets or school buildings, school budget overrides, and special districts. When Scottsdale voters approve a bond package, the city’s secondary rate is how it gets repaid. The ballot measures guide covers those elections.
The homeowner rebate
If the home is your primary residence and you own it, the state pays part of your school district’s primary tax. Since the 2022 tax year the rebate has been 50 percent of the qualifying school tax rate, up from 47.19 percent, capped at $600 a home. On the Treasurer’s bill it shows up as state aid to education. For the $500,000 Scottsdale Unified home, it cuts roughly $540 off the bill. It is state money, part of the funding system the state taxes guide explains.
Paying and appealing
Bills go out around September 1. The first half is due October 1 and is late after November 1; the second half is due March 1 and is late after May 1. Late taxes accrue 16 percent simple interest. Most homeowners never see the deadlines because their mortgage lender pays from escrow.
Appeals happen at the valuation stage, not the billing stage. You have 60 days from the mailing of your Notice of Value to petition the Assessor. After that, the State Board of Equalization or the Arizona Tax Court can hear an appeal.
Same city, different bills
School district boundaries don’t follow city limits, so a Scottsdale address can land in any of several districts, and the school district is the biggest line on the bill. On the 2026 rates, before the homeowner rebate, a Scottsdale home in Scottsdale Unified pays about $6.91 per $100 of assessed value, one in Paradise Valley Unified about $8.99, and one in Cave Creek Unified about $5.46. The city, county and countywide lines are identical in all three; the difference is the school district’s primary rate and whatever bonds and overrides its voters have approved. Smaller slices of Scottsdale sit in Fountain Hills Unified and, in the south, in the Tempe and Balsz elementary districts. The school districts guide maps them.
Why the city’s slice is small
Scottsdale keeps its primary property tax small and builds its general fund mainly on sales and bed taxes, which visitors help pay. In the 2026 levy the city’s primary levy is about $40 million and its bond levy about $37 million, on a net assessed value of about $8.6 billion. Scottsdale Unified alone levies about $230 million across primary, overrides and bonds. Because homes are cheap to tax relative to the resorts and shops that generate sales tax, Scottsdale’s property tax argument is usually about bonds: whether voters will approve a package, and so a secondary rate, for streets, parks or public safety.
How the caps came to be
Arizona’s modern limits are the residue of two voter revolts. In 1980, after the property-tax uprisings that began with California’s Prop 13, voters wrote the 1 percent residential cap and the levy limits into the constitution. For three decades homes then had two values: a limited one for primary taxes and the full cash value for secondary taxes, so bond rates rode every housing bubble up. Prop 117 in 2012 ended that, moving every tax onto a single capped value from 2015. The effect is visible in hot markets: when Scottsdale home prices jump, full cash values jump with them, but the taxable value climbs no more than 5 percent a year, so bills rise gradually and the gap between market value and taxable value can grow for years.
The cap doesn’t freeze your bill. Districts can raise rates, voters can approve new bonds and overrides, and a home whose limited value is still well below market will keep climbing 5 percent a year until it catches up.