Kankakee's Tax Rate Fell to Its Lowest Since 2007. So Why Didn't Rental Owners' Bills Fall With It?

"If your taxes go up, it's because your property value is growing," Mayor Chris Curtis said in December 2025, according to the Kankakee Daily Journal. He was presenting a levy that would push the City of Kankakee's tax rate to its lowest level since 2007. Both halves of that are true, and they matter a lot if you're underwriting a two-flat or a single-family rental in Kankakee. The rate dropped because the city's residential tax base grew almost 15% in one year while the commercial base shrank. That shift puts more of the city's levy on homes and small rentals. On those properties, a lower rate can still come with a bigger bill.

The Rate Fell Because the Base Grew

Each taxing body sets a levy, which is the dollar amount it wants to collect. That levy is divided by the equalized assessed value, or EAV, of all property in its boundaries. When EAV grows faster than the levy, the rate goes down, even though the body is collecting more money.

The Kankakee County Clerk's tax computation reports for tax year 2024 and tax year 2025 show exactly that for the City of Kankakee. Tax year 2025 covers the bills owners paid during 2026.

The city's rate fell about 7%, but its extension went up by roughly $273,000. Every district that shows up on a Kankakee bill followed the same pattern. The Kankakee Township rate reports show Kankakee School District 111, the largest piece of the bill, falling from 4.9979 to 4.6897. The county, the park district and Kankakee Community College all show lower rates too. The county-wide adjustment didn't cause any of this. The Illinois Department of Revenue kept Kankakee County's 2025 equalization factor at 1.0000, the same as 2024. The growth came from local assessments.

Homes Picked Up the Share Commercial Property Gave Back

Put the two years next to each other. Residential EAV in the city grew about 14.8%, while commercial EAV fell about 2.8%. In tax year 2024, residential property made up roughly 66.6% of the city's EAV. In tax year 2025 it made up about 69.6%. Commercial dropped from about 24.7% to about 21.9%.

The levy is divided by share. When residential property's slice of the base gets bigger, it also takes a bigger slice of every dollar the city, the schools and the county collect.

New construction also explains less than the headline suggests. The Daily Journal reported that the roughly $35 million jump in valuation caught the administration off guard, since it had expected growth in the $10 million to $15 million range. The paper said Curtis pointed to new construction, including the Ricky Rocket Fuel Center and the $11.5 million memory care expansion at Asbury of Kankakee. The county's final computation report, though, lists only $958,207 of new property in the city for tax year 2025. The total base grew by about $33 million. Nearly all of the increase came from properties already on the rolls being valued higher.

The Break-Even Number for Any Kankakee Parcel

The rate drop gives you a clean test. The total rate for tax code 16003 fell from 11.8227 to 11.0747. Divide one by the other and you get about 1.0675. A parcel in that tax code whose EAV rose more than about 6.75% between tax years 2024 and 2025 got a bigger bill. A parcel whose EAV rose less got a smaller one, or roughly the same.

Total residential EAV in the city grew 14.8%, more than double that break-even. That's growth in the class as a whole, and individual parcels moved by different amounts. Here's how it plays out for a hypothetical rental with $30,000 of EAV in tax year 2024, before any exemptions:

1. Tax year 2024: $30,000 × 11.8227% comes to about $3,547.
2. Tax year 2025, EAV up 14.8%, matching the residential total: $34,440 × 11.0747% comes to about $3,814, an increase of roughly $267, or 7.5%.
3. Tax year 2025, EAV flat: $30,000 × 11.0747% comes to about $3,322, a decrease of roughly $224.

Those three lines are the gap between the headline and the bill. Both owners would have heard that rates were down. Their bills went in opposite directions. Tax code also matters. Code 16003 covers the city and carries the city's levy. The township's 16001 code came in at 7.6399 for tax year 2025, so the same EAV produces a very different bill depending on which code a parcel falls in.

Why a Rental Takes More of the Shift Than the Owner-Occupied House Next Door

The same EAV doesn't produce the same bill on every residential parcel. The Illinois Department of Revenue's exemption guide says the General Homestead Exemption applies to residential property occupied by its owner as a principal dwelling. Outside Cook County and the counties that border it, the reduction is capped at $6,000 of EAV. The guide also describes a narrow leasehold situation that can qualify. In the usual investor setup, where the owner lives somewhere else and a tenant lives in the unit, the parcel generally doesn't get this reduction.

At the tax year 2025 rate for code 16003, $6,000 of EAV is worth about $664 a year. When the residential base grows and the levy shifts toward homes, a rental with no homestead reduction carries that higher share on its full EAV. Over a ten-year hold, that gap shows up in your cash flow every year.

What the Bill Means Against the Rent Roll

Kankakee County assessments averaged 33.15% of market value, based on sales from 2022 through 2024, according to the state's 2025 multiplier announcement. At a total rate of 11.0747, a city parcel assessed at that county average pays roughly 3.7% of its market value in property tax each year. On a $90,000 rental, that's about $3,300 before any exemption, which is more than a quarter of a year's rent at the listing-based median.

The rent side is less certain. One rental listing site's October 2026 snapshot puts Kankakee's median asking rent at $1,012 a month, up 13% from a year earlier. That figure comes from only 20 active listings, so treat it as a sample, not a market. The tax figure comes from official county records. That's why the expense side of a Kankakee rental is the more reliable number to underwrite.

The city adds a smaller cost, but it comes with a catch at closing. Kankakee requires an operating license for any dwelling occupied by someone other than its legal owner, even when no rent is collected. The fee is $65 for the first unit plus $11 for each additional unit. The license doesn't transfer, so a buyer has to apply for a new one. The City's code FAQ says inspections happen at the start and then every two years. Every unit in a multi-unit building gets inspected, occupied or not, and the owner or agent has to attend with water, gas and electricity on. The fee schedule in Chapter 8 of the city code lists $100 for a third inspection and $300 for each one after that. If a building needs repeat visits to pass, budget for those charges along with the tax bill.

What Could Move the Split Again

Two forces will decide whether residential property keeps taking a larger share. One is whether commercial and new construction add value faster than existing homes appreciate. The other is how much the levies grow.

The supply side has some named projects. At the Kankakee County Chamber's State of the Municipalities event at The Majestic on Oct. 1, 2026, the Daily Journal reported that Curtis set a goal of 500 new residential units in the city by 2030. Downtown, the Co.LAB project plans a three-story, 47-unit market-rate apartment building and a roughly 30,000-square-foot business incubator in a former bank. The Daily Journal reported in March 2026 that both are now targeting an October 2027 opening. On the commercial side, the Daily Journal's December 2025 report named the QuikTrip fuel station in south Kankakee as a long-discussed project the mayor expected to open in 2026. New value from projects like these goes onto the rolls and spreads each levy over a larger base.

The levy side has a date. Illinois taxing bodies have to adopt their levies by Dec. 31, so the City Council's tax year 2026 levy will be set in the next several weeks. That vote, together with the residential and commercial EAV figures the county publishes next spring, will show whether the 2025 shift continued.

FAQ

Does a lower Kankakee tax rate mean my rental's bill went down? Only if the parcel's EAV rose by less than about 6.75% between tax years 2024 and 2025 in tax code 16003. Total residential EAV in the city rose about 14.8%, but your parcel's own change is what sets the bill.

Where can I see my parcel's assessment and bill history? The Kankakee County Treasurer links to a public property tax lookup and a list of township assessors for 2026. Payment deadlines are on the Treasurer's important-dates page.

Do I need a new rental license if I buy an occupied building? Yes. The City says operating licenses don't transfer, so a buyer has to apply for a new one.

This post is general information, not legal, tax or financial advice. Before you rely on any assessment, exemption or licensing figure for a specific property, confirm it with your township assessor, a tax professional or the City.

If you're pricing a Kankakee rental, Taylor Dixon Group can run the numbers on that parcel's own assessment history and tax code before you write an offer, so your projected cash flow uses the actual bill, not the headline rate.