Why Property Taxes Are So High
New Hampshire relies heavily on local property taxes to fund public education, providing the lowest percentage of state funding for K-12 schools in the nation. Because the state covers only a small fraction of the cost per student, local school districts must raise more than 70% of their operational expenses through local and statewide property taxes.
Why the System Drives High Property Taxes
Low State Share: The state provides a limited "adequacy" grant per pupil, which falls far short of what schools actually spend.
Local Burden: To bridge the massive gap between state aid and real-world school costs, local municipalities are forced to levy heavy local school property taxes.
Locally Managed State Taxes: Even the state-mandated Statewide Education Property Tax (SWEPT) is collected locally and kept by the town rather than pooled and redistributed statewide by Concord.
Disparities in Town Wealth: "Property-poor" towns with lower property values and fewer businesses must set extremely high tax rates to raise enough money for their schools compared to property-wealthy towns.
How We Got Here
2025-HB 115 – relative to universal eligibility for the education freedom account program
This bill would remove the income limit from the school voucher program, allowing all students in the state to use the program. This would drastically increase the cost of the voucher program to over $100 million a year, almost entirely to pay for students who were already enrolled in private schools or being homeschooled that the State was not previously paying to support. This will siphon money away from other uses that would benefit public education in the state.
The bill was amended by the house to raise the income limit to 400% of the federal poverty guideline for the 2025-26 school year, and remove all limits starting in the 2026-27 school year. The bill passed 198-180.
The House Finance Committee included the language of the bill in its proposed State Budget. This bill was ultimately retained by the Senate, but a nearly identical bill, SB 295, creating a universal voucher eligibility was passed and signed into law on June 10.