How Much Are Property Taxes in Kansas City by County?

By Joe Nelson, Retired Air Force, Nelson Home Group Team Leader and Mortgage Loan Originator

Direct answer: among the districts verified here, effective property tax rates in the Kansas City metro run from about 1.09% to 1.76% of market value, and the spread is not what most people assume. The cheapest district in this study is in Johnson County, Kansas. The most expensive is in Wyandotte County, Kansas. On a $200,000 home that gap is about $1,330 a year, every year, for as long as you own the house.

I run this calculation for every client before they get attached to a neighborhood, because it changes what you can comfortably afford more than most buyers expect. Below is the verified table, the method behind it, and the reason a single number for a whole county is not a real number. Property taxes are one line in what it costs to buy your first home here. Once you own the house, that bill usually gets paid through escrow, and I cover how that account gets funded at closing in what prepaids and the initial escrow deposit cover. The first check you write in the process comes earlier, and I cover who writes the earnest money check and which account it should come from.

What are the property tax rates by county in Kansas City?

Updated August 31, 2026 using tax-year 2025 certified levies. Every figure below comes from a county clerk’s certified levy sheet or a state levy report, converted to effective rate on market value using each state’s statutory assessment ratio. Kansas figures assume a $200,000 home, and I explain why that matters further down.

County and taxing district	Total levy	Effective rate on $200,000
Johnson KS: Prairie Village, USD 512 Shawnee Mission	102.446 mills	1.092%
Johnson KS: Overland Park, USD 229 Blue Valley	104.463 mills	1.115%
Johnson KS: Leawood, USD 229 Blue Valley	113.424 mills	1.218%
Leavenworth KS: Leavenworth city, USD 453	122.317 mills	1.320%
Clay MO: Gladstone residential, North Kansas City 74	$7.0338 per $100	1.336%
Leavenworth KS: Bonner Springs	137.134 mills	1.491%
Jackson MO: Kansas City, tax code 001	$8.3882 per $100	1.594%
Leavenworth KS: Basehor	147.324 mills	1.608%
Wyandotte KS: Bonner Springs	151.822 mills	1.660%
Wyandotte KS: Kansas City KS, USD 500	160.381 mills	1.758%

Two counties are missing on purpose. Cass County is not included because I have not verified its levy sheet to the same standard. Platte County gets its own section below, because the county clerk publishes every component but does not publish a combined total, so any Platte number is arithmetic rather than a printed figure.

Why can’t you compare a Kansas mill levy to a Missouri levy directly?

Because they are different units measured against different bases, and this is where most published comparisons go wrong.

Missouri assesses residential property at 19% of market value and expresses levies per $100 of assessed value. Kansas assesses residential at 11.5% and expresses levies in mills, meaning dollars per $1,000 of assessed value. A Missouri levy of 8.3882 and a Kansas levy of 104.463 are not on the same scale, and putting them in a column next to each other without converting produces a number that looks authoritative and means nothing.

The conversion is simple once you know the ratios. Missouri: levy per $100 multiplied by 0.19 gives the effective percentage. Jackson County tax code 001 at 8.3882 works out to 1.594%. Kansas: market value times 11.5% gives assessed value, times the mill levy divided by 1,000 gives the tax.

Why does the Kansas rate change with the price of the house?

Kansas exempts the first $75,000 of a home’s appraised value from the 20-mill statewide school levy. That exemption is a fixed dollar amount, not a percentage, so it shrinks as a share of the bill as the price rises.

In practice the exemption is worth $172.50 a year to every Kansas homeowner regardless of price. On a $200,000 house that is 0.086 percentage points off the effective rate. On a $400,000 house it is half that.

So the Kansas effective percentage changes with the home value used in the calculation. On the Missouri side the percentage stays linear with assessed value, although parcel-specific credits or exemptions can still change an individual bill. Every Kansas figure in the table above is anchored to $200,000.

Does the county alone decide your tax bill?

No, and this is the part that makes county averages misleading. Your bill is the sum of every taxing district your parcel sits inside: the state, the county, your city, your school district, sometimes a library, a community college, a fire district, an ambulance district, a road district, or a recreation commission.

Wyandotte County shows this cleanly, because four cities appear on one county sheet. Kansas City, Kansas runs 160.381 mills. Edwardsville runs 155.213. Lake Quivira runs 153.843. Bonner Springs runs 151.822. Same county, about $200 a year of difference on a $200,000 house.

How can one city have two different property tax rates?

Bonner Springs sits on a county line, and it appears on two different 2025 levy sheets with two different totals. On the Wyandotte County sheet it is 151.822 mills, or 1.660%. On the Leavenworth County sheet it is 137.134 mills, or 1.491%.

Same city. Same city government. About 14.7 mills of difference, roughly $338 a year on a $200,000 house, decided by which side of a county line your parcel happens to fall on. If you are shopping Bonner Springs, that is a question to ask before you write an offer, not after.

JOE’S TAKE: A county average is a statistic. Your tax bill is an address. Those are not the same thing, and the difference has real money in it.

What about Platte County?

Platte County needs its own answer, because it is the county where this goes wrong most often.

The Platte County Commission voted to reduce the county’s own property tax levy to $0.01 per $100 of assessed value, applying to 2025 and 2026 property taxes. That is a real reduction and it is worth knowing about. It is also one line on a bill that has ten or more lines, and quoting it as though it were the tax rate makes Platte County look nearly tax-free when it is not.

Building the actual stack for a Kansas City address inside the Park Hill School District from the clerk’s published components gives 8.1470 per $100, which converts to about 1.548%. That figure is arithmetic, not a printed total, and it excludes ambulance, fire, and road districts, which the clerk lists separately and which vary by address. Add North Regional Ambulance at 0.6548 and the same house lands closer to 1.672%.

So Platte is not in the ranked table above. If you are buying in Platte County and want a real number, the county clerk can give you the tax-code total for a specific parcel, and that is the number I would use.

How many counties are actually in the Kansas City metro?

Depends who is counting, and both answers are defensible. The federal government’s Office of Management and Budget delineates a 14-county Kansas City metropolitan statistical area. The Mid-America Regional Council, the metro’s own planning organization, serves a nine-county region. When you hear nine counties locally, that is MARC’s footprint, not the census definition.

For a buyer, the number that matters is smaller than either. In the searches I handle, most buyers concentrate on Jackson, Clay, Platte, and Cass on the Missouri side and Johnson, Wyandotte, and Leavenworth on the Kansas side. Those seven are the ones buyers ask me about.

Frequently Asked Questions

Which Kansas City county has the lowest property taxes?

Of the districts verified here, Prairie Village in Johnson County, Kansas is lowest at about 1.092% on a $200,000 home, followed by Overland Park at 1.115%. That surprises people who assume Johnson County is uniformly expensive. Johnson County home prices are higher than the metro average, so the dollar bill is often larger even where the rate is lower.

Which county has the highest?

Kansas City, Kansas in Wyandotte County, at about 1.758% on a $200,000 home, based on the county’s certified 2025 levy sheet.

Are Kansas or Missouri property taxes cheaper in Kansas City?

Neither side wins outright. The lowest and the highest districts in this study are both in Kansas. The Missouri districts cluster in the middle, from about 1.336% in Gladstone to 1.594% in Kansas City, Jackson County. The state line is not the variable that decides your bill. Your specific taxing districts are. For everything else that differs across the line, see my Kansas versus Missouri cost comparison.

Why is my actual tax bill different from the rate in this table?

Because your parcel may sit in different city, school, fire, library, road, or special districts than the representative district I used. I use these numbers to compare locations, then pull the specific parcel before you write an offer.

Should I use the listing’s property tax number to calculate my payment?

As a starting point, yes. Then verify the parcel and its current taxing districts. A mortgage payment built on the wrong tax line is fake precision, and it is usually wrong in the direction that hurts.

Do these rates change every year?

Yes. Levies are certified annually and can move in either direction, and assessed values are reset on their own schedule. Every figure here is tax year 2025. Treat it as a comparison tool, not as a quote for a specific parcel.

Ready to Talk?

We closed 38 first-time buyer clients through the first seven months of 2026, on both sides of the state line, which is how this table got built in the first place. I am a licensed Realtor and a licensed mortgage loan originator, so the tax line and the payment it produces get run by the same person.

If you want your actual numbers on an actual house, that is a conversation, not a commitment. We will run it and tell you honestly what we find.

Call or text: (816) 680-6624
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Web: https://nelsonhomegroupkc.com/