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Detached houses in Leipzig: gentle pressure with the help of reminders
Photo: Jan Woitas / picture alliance / dpa
A few days before the deadline, the rate for submitting property tax returns is around 65 percent.
A spokeswoman for the Federal Ministry of Finance said on Friday that 56.9 percent of the owners concerned had now submitted the declaration electronically.
In addition, there would be an additional 8.6 percent of those subject to property tax who submitted the declaration on paper.
However, this does not include the declarations that still leave questions unanswered for the tax authorities.
Of course, the exact number cannot yet be estimated;
in view of the bureaucratic effort that each declaration requires, however, it should by no means be negligible.
For the planned real estate tax reform, 36 million properties have to be revalued.
The deadline expires on January 31, i.e. next Tuesday.
According to a query by the Finanztip advice portal, defaulting owners do not have to expect late surcharges or even fines for the time being.
14 of the 16 federal states initially want to apply gentle pressure with the help of reminders.
However, experts advise submitting the property tax return as soon as possible.
In an emergency, the tax office will estimate the property tax value that determines the tax – and that should usually not be of any advantage to the taxpayer.
The Federal Constitutional Court declared the current rating system unconstitutional in 2018 because similar properties are treated differently.
The previous calculation is based on property values that are decades old - in the west they date from 1964, in the east from 1935. The reform of the property tax should retain the principle that the valuation is based on the value of a property.
However, the assessment rate, which each municipality can set at its own discretion, will be decisive for the amount of the tax.
In principle, it is true that the total volume should be similar to that according to the old calculation.
But it is also clear that the weighting will shift: real estate owners whose house or apartment has increased in value must expect significant premiums.
According to the Federal Ministry of Finance, some taxpayers will have to pay more property tax, others less.
mike/AFP