Land in San Diego County is now more valuable than it has ever been.
The assessed value of all taxable real property in San Diego County, including residential, commercial and industrial land, is now $768 billion, the Assessor's Office announced this week. That figure represents a 5.58 percent increase between Jan. 1, 2023 and Jan. 1, 2024, the highest in county history.
For comparison, that's more than Poland's gross domestic product ($688 billion) and the massive infrastructure spending bill passed in 2021 ($760 billion).
Land values in San Diego County have risen nearly every year for the past 30 years, except for three declines during the Great Recession in the late 2000s.
The majority of taxable land in the county is residential with 1,017,929 parcels, followed by business land with 56,839 parcels, boats with 14,852 and aircraft with 1,576.
Taxes help pay for schools, libraries, parks, public safety and other government services. Assessor Jordan Marks said the office received a 98.2 percent positive rating for customer service this year.
“The 2024 tax rolls demonstrate that San Diego County is the highest standard for fairness, transparency and putting taxpayers first,” he said.
No one wants to pay the tax, but at least San Diego homeowners still benefit from Proposition 13, which limits annual property tax increases to 2 percent, Marks said. The 1978 law affected 91 percent of properties in the county this year, Marks said.
Among local areas, San Diego had the highest land assessment at $369 billion, followed by Carlsbad at $46.4 billion, Chula Vista at $43.1 billion and Oceanside at $34.4 billion. Imperial Beach and Lemon Grove had the lowest land assessments, both at $3.4 billion.
San Marcos had the greatest land value growth at $19.2 billion, up 7.5% over the year as of Jan. 1. El Cajon had the lowest land value at $13.5 billion, up 3.3%.
The countywide increase of 5.58 percent is lower than the 7.1 percent increase in 2022, when home prices were rising at a faster pace than last year. In 2005, property prices rose 13.3 percent, the highest on record in a single year. But the Great Recession caused property prices to fall 2.31 percent in 2009, 1.56 percent in 2010 and 0.14 percent in 2012.
The Assessor's Office implemented several programs last year that reduced the total amount of taxes collected by roughly $300 million. Programs include property tax relief for flood victims, lowering home assessments after a temporary market downturn, and savings for disabled veterans, nonprofits and homeless service providers.