Montello School District - Understanding Your Property Tax Bill

Tax bills are mailed annually in mid-December. The following information will help to understand the different sections of the tax statement.

Please note an important piece of information is not included on your property tax bill – the mill rate. The mill rate is the tax rate per $1000 of estimated fair market value for the school district portion of your tax bill. MSD current mill rate (levy) rate is $5.20.

If you have any questions about your tax bill, you can reach out to the County Treasurer at 608-297-3030.

The displayed image shows a tax statement from 2025. Each municipality bill might look a little different, but the same general information is provided. Each letter corresponds to a description below the image. A definition of terms can be found below.

Click on this LINK to learn more about each letter.

Definition of Terms

The following terms are used on tax bills, in this document, and in other written material about property taxes.

Assessed Value: The value that is assigned to property by the assessor for the purpose of taxation.
Assessment Ratio: The average assessment ratio is provided by the Wisconsin Department of Revenue and is used in calculating the estimated fair market value shown on tax bills. Assessed value is divided by the average assessment ratio to get the estimated fair market value. For example, if the assessment of a parcel of land which sold for $150,000 (fair market value) was $140,000, the assessment ratio is said to be 93% (140,000 divided by 150,000).
Equalized Value: This is the estimated value of all taxable real and personal property in the district. The value used is the market value, which is the most probable selling price.
Fair Market Value: This is the real market value of a property. In other words, it is the price for which a property would be sold by a willing seller to a willing buyer, under normal market conditions.
Levy: The total amount of property taxes imposed by a taxing jurisdiction. School district levies may include general operations, property tax chargebacks, debt service, capital expansion, and community service.
Taxation District: A city, village, or town. If a city or village lies in more than one county, this is the portion of the city or village which lies within each county.
Taxing Jurisdiction: Any entity authorized by law to levy taxes on property located within its boundaries. This includes the state, the city (or other local government), the county, the school district, and/or the local technical college.

Note. Information on this page came from the Wisconsin Department of Revenue, the City of Montello, Marquette County, and the Wisconsin Legislative Reference Bureau.