If you pay $700,000 for a house in Hood River this winter, what will your property tax be? The purchase price doesn't answer that. The answer comes from the house's own account at the Hood River County assessor's office, built up year by year since the 1990s. The bond voters approved on November 3 makes that easy to see.
City of Hood River voters passed Measure 14-86, a general obligation bond to renovate and expand the police station. The same ballot carried Measure 14-85, an affordable housing bond, and it failed. In the county's Update #2 of the November 3 results, 14-86 had 2,206 yes votes to 1,760 no, and 14-85 had 1,733 yes to 2,251 no. The county scheduled another results update for November 11 and plans to certify by November 30, 2026.
The city's Measure 14-86 FAQ prices the bond at $0.34 per $1,000 of assessed value. It says the owner of a home assessed at $271,302, which the city calls the median home value in Hood River, would pay about $7.69 a month, or $92.28 a year. The bond raises $8.7 million over 20 years. The FAQ also notes that assessed value is "different, and typically lower, than market value." That gap matters more than anything else in this post.
The number on the bill is about 38 cents on the market dollar
Hood River County's assessment and tax roll for tax year 2025–26 shows how wide the gap is. The county counted 4,403 improved residential accounts. Together they had about $1.18 billion in taxable assessed value and about $3.04 billion in real market value. In other words, residential property in the county is taxed on roughly 39 cents of every dollar of market value.
Oregon's Measure 50 system explains the gap. The Oregon Department of Revenue describes it in its FY 2025–26 property tax statistics report. Each property has a maximum assessed value, or MAV. Measure 50 set the starting MAV at 90% of the property's 1995–96 real market value, and it generally lets MAV grow by no more than 3% a year unless the property is substantially improved. Taxable assessed value is the lower of MAV and real market value. The assessor then multiplies assessed value by the combined tax rates of every district the property sits in.
Hood River home values have risen much faster than 3% a year over that period, so assessed values have fallen further and further behind them. The city's own housing-bond page cites Zillow figures showing Hood River home values up 139% between 2012 and 2024. Assessed value can't keep pace with that.
The assessment stays with the house when it sells
This is where buyers coming from other states tend to get caught out. The DOR's maximum assessed value manual lists the specific changes that can raise a property's MAV by more than the usual 3%:
New property or new improvements to property. The property has been partitioned or subdivided. The property has been rezoned and is being used consistent with the rezoning. Previously omitted property has now been taken into account. The property has been disqualified from exemption, partial exemption, or special assessment.
A sale is not on that list. The manual treats MAV as belonging to each tax account and updates it from the prior year's figures. For a buyer, that means the seller's most recent tax statement is the best preview of your own. Two Hood River houses that sell for similar prices can carry different assessed values, because each one's MAV has its own history of additions, partitions and other changes.
The new bond follows the same rule. At $0.34 per $1,000, the police bond adds more to a house with a high assessed value than to one with a low assessed value, whatever either one sold for.
A new build or an addition starts from a county ratio
New construction works differently. When a house is built, or a garage, second story or accessory dwelling unit is added, the assessor doesn't use the 3% path. DOR's rule is to multiply the real market value of the new part by the county's changed property ratio, or CPR, and add the result to MAV. The CPR is the average MAV of properties that didn't change that year divided by their average real market value, calculated separately for each property class.
Hood River County publishes this ratio, and it has been falling.
| Hood River County residential figure | Value | Period |
|---|---|---|
| Residential changed property ratio | 42.1% | 2022, per the county's CPR explainer |
| Residential changed property ratio | 38.476%, rounded to 38.5% | 2025–26 tax year, county schedule dated October 15, 2025 |
| Median real market value, improved residential | $568,720 | 2025–26 tax year |
| Median assessed value at that ratio | $218,821 | 2025–26 tax year, county calculation |
A falling ratio means market values for existing homes rose faster than their capped assessed values. A new home or addition is assessed at the current ratio, so a lower ratio means a lighter assessment for new work. Even so, new work is assessed against today's market values. An older house's MAV has been growing at no more than 3% a year since the 1990s.
The county's median assessed value of $218,821 comes from multiplying the median market value by the CPR. The city's bond materials use a different median, $271,302. The county figure covers the whole county, and the city figure is the one tied to the bond estimate.
Putting a rate on it
For tax year 2025–26, the county's billing-rate schedule shows a consolidated rate of $14.9192 per $1,000 of assessed value for code area 1. DOR's FY 2025–26 tables split the City of Hood River's roughly $14.92 total into about $2.20 for the county, $2.81 for the city, $8.50 for schools and $1.41 for other districts. The county-wide average effective rate that year was $13.90 per $1,000.
Applied to the county's 2025–26 median assessed value of $218,821, the code area 1 rate works out to roughly $3,265 a year before the new bond. At $0.34 per $1,000, the bond would add about $74 on that same assessed value. Those are 2025–26 inputs. The 2026–27 amounts for individual properties are already in the county's records, and the account lookup is where to check a specific house.
Before you write the offer
The county and the city each provide a lookup tool, and together they show what a house will cost to own.
- Pull the account. The Hood River County tax page says 2026–27 property tax amounts are online. Statements were scheduled to go out in late October, and the first one-third payment is due November 16, 2026. The county warns that owner names and addresses on its payment page may be out of date, but says the tax amounts are correct.
- Run the address through the city estimator. The City of Hood River Bond Cost Estimator gives an estimate for a specific property based on its assessed value.
- List anything recent or planned. If the seller recently added space, or you plan to add an ADU or a second story, that new value is added to MAV at the residential CPR. It's the one part of the bill that starts from current market values.
- Ask about land divisions. Partitioning or subdividing a lot is on DOR's list of exceptions to the 3% limit, so a newly created parcel follows different math.
For buyers planning an ADU, one more city item affects the budget, though it sits outside the tax bill. The September 14, 2026 City Council packet included Ordinance 2098, which would put into code an existing waiver of water and sewer system development charges for ADUs that share connections with the main house. It doesn't waive the transportation, stormwater, school or park charges.
All of this is general information, not legal, tax or financial advice. Confirm the figures for a specific property with the Hood River County assessor and your own tax professional.
FAQ
Does the police bond show up on this year's tax statement? The 2026–27 statements were scheduled to mail in late October, before the November 3 election. The city says the bond can be issued in more than one series, each paid off within 20 years, with a principal cap of $8.7 million. The city also says actual borrowing, and the resulting tax rate, can come down if it secures outside grants such as state seismic funding.
What happened to the housing bond? Measure 14-85 would have levied $0.39 per $1,000 of assessed value for 20 years to raise $8.7 million for affordable housing. It failed. With it, the city said, there would be no new property tax for housing. The city also said it remains committed to housing and will share future plans with the community.
Can my assessed value ever be higher than market value? No. Under DOR's definition, taxable assessed value is the lower of maximum assessed value and real market value.
For Hood River sellers, the gap between your assessed value and today's market value is part of what a buyer will weigh, and a clear valuation helps you show it. If you'd like to see how your home's market value compares with the number on your tax statement, Julie Gilbert will put the two side by side. Get your free home valuation.
