The DeVito Team · Keller Williams Realty Greater Nassau
The deadline, how to file yourself, what evidence counts, and what happens next.
Deadline: In Suffolk County a grievance is filed with your town by Grievance Day, the third Tuesday in May. The 2026 Grievance Day was Tuesday, May 19, 2026; each town posts the next date with its tentative roll.
Cost: nothing to file. You can file on your own, without a lawyer or a grievance firm.
Source: NYS Tax Department and the towns' own notices (below). Checked October 30, 2026.
A tax grievance is a request to lower your property's assessment, the value the assessor places on it. It does not challenge the tax rates. Your share of the school, town and county taxes is figured from that assessment, so if the assessment is higher than it should be, a successful grievance lowers your bill. In Suffolk County you file with your town, not the county.
Suffolk's ten towns each assess property and each have a Board of Assessment Review. In Suffolk, Grievance Day is the third Tuesday in May, a week earlier than most of New York. The towns file their tentative rolls around May 1, so the window between seeing your new assessment and the deadline is short.
2026: tentative rolls on or around May 1; Grievance Day Tuesday, May 19, 2026 (passed).
The next Grievance Day is the third Tuesday in May 2027. Each town posts the date and its filing hours with its tentative roll.
Source: NYS Tax Department; 2026 date from the Brookhaven, East Hampton, Islip, Shelter Island and Southold notices. Checked October 30, 2026.
Your town's assessor:
The State Tax Department recognizes four grounds: an assessment that is excessive (higher than the home's market value), unequal (assessed at a higher level than other property), unlawful, or misclassified. Most homeowners argue the first. For that, the State says the best support is sales of comparable homes that sold for less than the assessor's estimate of your home's market value. You must show the board that your property is over-assessed.
Source: NYS Tax Department, completing your grievance; contesting your assessment.
From 2013 to 2025, the median annual tax on Suffolk County homes sold went from about $8,900 to about $11,200 (+26%), while the median sale price went from $325,000 to $677,700 (+109%). So tax as a share of price fell, from 2.75% to 1.66%. These are medians across all recorded sales, not any one owner's bill; a grievance turns on your own home's value against the assessor's figure.
| Year | Median tax | Median price | Tax ÷ price | Sales |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2013 | $8,900 | $325,000 | 2.75% | 10,851 |
| 2014 | $9,100 | $320,000 | 2.83% | 11,320 |
| 2015 | $9,400 | $330,000 | 2.85% | 12,469 |
| 2016 | $9,600 | $337,500 | 2.84% | 14,501 |
| 2017 | $9,600 | $355,000 | 2.72% | 15,653 |
| 2018 | $9,700 | $377,500 | 2.58% | 15,857 |
| 2019 | $10,000 | $400,000 | 2.50% | 16,102 |
| 2020 | $10,400 | $446,200 | 2.32% | 16,108 |
| 2021 | $10,500 | $514,000 | 2.04% | — |
| 2022 | $10,600 | $550,000 | 1.93% | 15,382 |
| 2023 | $10,700 | $572,000 | 1.86% | 12,081 |
| 2024 | $10,900 | $635,000 | 1.72% | 12,491 |
| 2025 | $11,200 | $677,700 | 1.66% | 12,517 |
Median of each full calendar year's recorded Suffolk County closings that report an annual tax (MLS records). Taxes are as recorded at the time of sale. Year 2021 omitted: the MLS record for Suffolk County is materially incomplete that year, so a count for it would understate it. Medians for that year are unaffected and are shown where used.
Where prices are heading now. An assessment is an estimate of market value, so the direction of sale prices is the backdrop for any grievance. The monthly median sale price in Suffolk County averaged about $722,000 for Jul 2026–Sep 2026 (3,926 sales), against $685,000 for the same months a year earlier (+5%).
| Month | Median sale price | Sales |
|---|---|---|
| Oct 2025 | $675,000 | 1,356 |
| Nov 2025 | $680,000 | 1,041 |
| Dec 2025 | $675,000 | 1,234 |
| Jan 2026 | $670,000 | 940 |
| Feb 2026 | $655,000 | 808 |
| Mar 2026 | $670,000 | 837 |
| Apr 2026 | $670,000 | 831 |
| May 2026 | $675,000 | 948 |
| Jun 2026 | $715,000 | 1,153 |
| Jul 2026 | $715,000 | 1,353 |
| Aug 2026 | $730,300 | 1,352 |
| Sep 2026 | $720,000 | 1,221 |
Closed sales recorded in the MLS, all home types. A county-wide median moves with the mix of homes that sold each month.
District-by-district tax figures: Suffolk County property taxes by school district.
You do not need anyone's help to grieve. The State Tax Department says there is no cost to grieve an assessment and it does not require you to hire a lawyer; you can complete the form yourself. Some owners prefer to hire a representative, such as a grievance firm or an attorney, to prepare and file for them. If you do, read the agreement before you sign: how the fee is figured, which tax years it covers, and whether it renews on its own.
The annual tax is shown on listings, and buyers weigh it alongside the price. If your assessment looks high, check the grievance calendar before you list, and tell the attorney handling your sale about any appeal that is still pending.
In Suffolk County a grievance is filed with your town by Grievance Day, the third Tuesday in May. The 2026 Grievance Day was Tuesday, May 19, 2026; each town posts the next date with its tentative roll. Late filings are not accepted; Brookhaven, for example, returns anything submitted after Grievance Day.
With the assessor of your town, not with the county. Each of Suffolk's ten towns (Babylon, Brookhaven, East Hampton, Huntington, Islip, Riverhead, Shelter Island, Smithtown, Southampton and Southold) has its own Board of Assessment Review. The State complaint form is RP-524; some towns also take applications online. Check your town's instructions for how it accepts filings.
No. The New York State Tax Department says there is no cost to grieve an assessment and you do not need to hire a lawyer; you can complete the form yourself. The only fee comes later, if you take the board's decision to Small Claims Assessment Review: $30.
A homeowner can file for Small Claims Assessment Review (SCAR) within 30 days of the filing of the final assessment roll, with a $30 filing fee. East Hampton's 2026 calendar, for example, lists the final roll on July 1 and July 31 for SCAR. You must have filed a grievance with the town first.
No. A grievance challenges the assessment, the value placed on your property, not the tax rates. Assessors do not set taxes; the rates come from the school district, town, county and other taxing bodies. A lower assessment lowers your share of the tax.
The State Tax Department says that for most homeowners the best support is sales of comparable homes that sold for less than the assessor's estimate of your home's market value. Start by finding the market value the assessor has placed on your home, then compare it with recent sales of similar homes nearby.
No. STAR and other exemptions have their own applications. A grievance challenges the assessment itself, though it can also argue that an exemption was applied incorrectly.
Sources: NYS Tax Department, grievance procedures, contesting your assessment, completing your grievance, form RP-524, property tax calendar; the ten town assessors' pages above; STAR. Checked October 30, 2026.
Joseph DeVito is a New York Licensed Associate Real Estate Broker and a New York attorney. He does not act as both broker and attorney on the same transaction: here he acts as a real estate broker only, and he is not your attorney. Real estate services provided through Keller Williams Realty Greater Nassau are not legal representation. Everything on this site is general information for educational purposes only. It is not legal advice, it creates no attorney-client relationship, and it should not be relied on as legal advice — for advice about your own situation, consult your own attorney.
This page is general information about the assessment review process, not legal or tax advice for your property. Deadlines are set by the county and the towns and can change; confirm the current dates on the official calendar before you file.
The other Long Island county: Nassau County tax grievance.
The DeVito Team of Keller Williams Realty Greater Nassau
Joseph DeVito, NY Licensed Associate Real Estate Broker
400 Garden City Plaza Ste 438, Garden City, NY 11530 · (516) 770-3782
