Taxpayer Brief · Buncombe County
Where your county tax dollars go in FY2027
The Buncombe County budget for July 1, 2026 through June 30, 2027 — the one in effect now
Adopted June 2, 2026 · Prepared 2026-06-29 · Updated 2026-07-16: rate amended to 61.54¢ on 2021 values after the state reappraisal freeze (the City of Asheville set its own rate at 50.78¢ July 15); updated 2026-08-15 with the appeal deadline and the value your bill is figured on · Adopted figures
After a brutal austerity budget in FY2026, the county is spending again. The FY2027 general fund rose more than 10% — to $484.4 million — largely to restore the cuts Helene forced last year and to fund schools, EMS, and human services. Commissioners passed it and raised the tax rate to pay for it.
Update — July 14: the rate was amended to 61.54¢ on 2021 values
After this budget was adopted in June, a new state law forced Buncombe off its 2026 revaluation and back to 2021 property values for this year's tax bills. On July 14, 2026 the commissioners kept the budget whole by raising the county rate to 61.54¢ per $100 (from the 43.20¢ set in June) so the old, lower values still fund the same spending. The figures below are the amended rate on 2021 values. Bills are delayed and will post at tax.buncombenc.gov; the appraisal office is still working through more than 16,000 appeals of the shelved 2026 values. See "How the rate got here" at the foot of this brief.
Read the tax rate carefully — it is a real increase
Because the state freeze put the county back on 2021 values — the same values that were in effect last year — the honest yardstick is simple: your assessment did not change, but the rate did. The county rate went from 54.66¢ in FY2026 to 61.54¢ now, up 6.88 cents, about 12.6%, on the same house at the same value. (The 43.20¢ the county set in June was a different plan, priced on the 2026 revaluation that the state has now shelved; it never took effect.) Whether an individual owner pays more or less than they would have under the 2026 values depends on how much their home appreciated, but measured against last year's bill on the same 2021 value, the county share is up about 12.6%.
Where the general fund goes
Unlike the city, the county's big jobs are schools, public safety, and human services — together about 71 cents of every general-fund dollar.
Schools rose about $11.4M. Human services (social services, public health, aging, veterans) holds at ~$100M. A-B Tech's county contribution is about $8.7M (up ~$264K). (Fire services, in a separate fund, saw a larger single jump — about $14M.)
Where the money comes from
Property tax carries roughly two-thirds of the county general fund — which is why a revenue squeeze translates straight into a rate increase.
- Property tax — about $335 million (~69%, the dominant source)
- Sales tax — about $49.5 million
- State & federal (intergovernmental) — about $46.3 million (down slightly; commissioners cited falling state/federal revenue as a budget pressure)
- Charges for services — about $24.8 million
- Permits & fees — about $7.5 million
Revenue figures are from the adopted Annual Funds Ordinance, rounded to the nearest million.
One piece of that falling federal revenue is SNAP
Part of the drop is a new, permanent cost the 2025 federal budget law hands to the county. Washington has been paying half the cost of administering SNAP (food stamps); from October 2026 it pays a quarter, and because North Carolina is one of the states where counties, not the state, run the program, Buncombe absorbs the difference. The county estimates about $2 million in lost SNAP administrative revenue in FY2027, a partial year because the change starts October 1, 2026, three months into the budget year. The state's own county-by-county estimate puts Buncombe's full-year cost at about $2.8 million, the figure a complete county fiscal year will carry, starting in July 2027. It is folded into the intergovernmental total above, not shown as its own line.
That administrative cost is the county's piece. The same law also creates a second, much larger SNAP bill, one the 2025 law wrote to the state: for the first time North Carolina has to pay part of the food benefits themselves, an amount set by the state's payment error rate, from nothing up to about $420 million a year (about $150 million at the state's current rate), starting in October 2027. Buncombe residents help cover that as North Carolina taxpayers, and from October 1, 2027, under the 2026 state budget, as a county too: North Carolina recovers that share by withholding a slice of each county's sales-tax revenue, so it is Buncombe money even though it is not a line in the figures above.
What it costs you
| Assessed home value (2021) | County tax (61.54¢) |
|---|---|
| $300,000 | $1,846 |
| $400,000 | $2,462 |
| $500,000 | $3,077 |
| $600,000 | $3,692 |
These are illustrative round values — use the assessed value from your last tax bill (the county is pricing on the 2021 schedule again, adjusted for any change to the property since; an individual bill is the rate times your value). County tax only. If you live in unincorporated county you also pay the amended Unified Fire District (17.38¢); inside the Asheville City Schools district you also pay the amended 11.75¢ for schools; city residents add the city rate on top (the City of Asheville amended its own rate to 50.78¢ on the 2021 base at a July 15 special meeting).
Estimate your bill — unincorporated Buncombe
For unincorporated Buncombe (county rate + the unified fire rate, 78.92¢ per $100). Excludes any city/town rate, the Asheville City Schools district, exemptions or deferments, and separate stormwater/solid-waste fees. Uses the amended FY2027 rate on 2021 values the commissioners adopted July 14 after the state reappraisal freeze. An estimate — use the assessed value on your own last tax bill.
Housing, food & human services (where the county carries the most)
- Affordable housing — $13.4M in Affordable Housing Services Program authorizations (largest: Harmony Housing's $9.8M Coxe Ave construction loan), funded by a mix of the affordable-housing GO bond, general fund, and housing-trust program income — not single general-fund line items. The project-by-project list, and the requests that went unfunded, are in the county housing & food funding brief.
- Food access: MANNA FoodBank ($85K for Southside food access), Food Connection ($84K), Appalachian Sustainable Agriculture ($38K).
- Human services: Early Childhood Education grants ($4.05M), Isaac Coleman economic grants ($500K), and $1.2M in safety-net / behavioral-health grants (Haywood Street Respite, All Souls Counseling, WNC Community Health, and more).
- Honest caveat: demand far outran dollars — many homelessness-prevention, transitional-housing, food-access, and behavioral-health requests were marked "not recommended for funding."
What's new in FY2027
- Restoring last year's cuts is the theme — FY26 was the Helene austerity budget; FY27 builds services back, "structurally balanced" (one-time money only for one-time costs).
- 28 new positions (adopted, trimmed from the recommended count); a 2.71% cost-of-living raise for staff.
- Capital: two new EMS bases (EMS West ~$16.6M), an Emergency Operations Center design, a 911 center design for FY28, three library renovations; plus a $37M Helene recovery grant.
The bottom line for a taxpayer
You are paying about 12.6% more in county tax on the same 2021 value, and you are getting more county government for it than last year — schools funded, EMS expanded, human services restored. The state freeze put everyone back on 2021 values, so the increase shows up plainly in the rate: 54.66¢ last year to 61.54¢ now. The county funds more of this than anyone else in the region, but even at $484M the requests outnumber the dollars.
How the rate got here — the state reappraisal freeze
A state law, SB 889 (signed June 19, 2026), froze the 2026 revaluation for a year in counties that had one, Buncombe among them, pushing the county back to old (2021) values. An amendment, SB 474 (Session Law 2026-47, signed July 7, 2026), then adjusted which counties it caught. Four kinds are exempt: those under 12,000 people; those already due for reappraisal and under 150,000; those that taxed above 95 cents, special tax areas excluded, at any point in the last four taxable years; and disaster-area counties willing to hold their rate down. That last one was Buncombe's exit. The county could have kept the 2026 values, but only by adopting a rate at or below its revenue-neutral rate rounded up to the next whole cent. Rounding its 39.22¢ revenue-neutral rate up put the ceiling at 40¢. Taking that exit would have cut roughly $24.8 million from the county's own budget, and no one else's: the exemption did not reach the municipalities or the special taxing districts, whose own rates were never conditioned by it. On July 14, 2026 the commissioners chose the other path: bill on 2021 values and amend the county rate to 61.54¢ (from the 43.20¢ set in June) to keep the adopted budget whole. That rate also absorbs about $1.8 million in public-service-utility tax lost by reverting. Board Chair Amanda Edwards said the legislature "has singled out Buncombe County residents, ignoring our natural disaster recovery needs." Bills were delayed by the change and should reach the mail by late August 2026. Two different values are in play. The value your bill is figured on, from the 2021 schedule, is open to appeal through December 31, 2026, or 30 days past your notice date if that is later. The state law reopened that window past the board of equalization and review's adjournment, which this year was May 5, and the UNC School of Government reads the act as making that date irrelevant. Appeals are filed at tax.buncombenc.gov, and the assessor's office will mail a paper form on request at 828-250-4940. The 2026 reappraisal values are the other matter, and the appeals against them are not resolved. The county says staff are still working through those appeals and that the outcome will apply once the 2026 values take effect in 2027; its appeal portal describes a filed appeal as paused until then. One already filed does not need re-filing, unless the owner has a decision they disagree with. A taxpayer who has not challenged the 2026 value yet files in 2027, a second chance the act itself creates. The act requires a 2027 filing to be timely for an appraisal effective January 1, 2027. The UNC School of Government reads that as pointing back at the county's ordinary deadline rather than the full calendar year. An adjustment won on a 2026 reappraisal value takes effect with the tax year beginning July 1, 2027. That is also when the 2026 values themselves come back.
Sources: Buncombe County FY2027 Adopted Budget in Brief and Annual Funds Ordinance; FY2027 budget adoption release (June 2, 2026); Blue Ridge Public Radio, WLOS, Mountain Xpress. Function and revenue figures (and the $698M all-funds total) are from the adopted ordinance and Budget-in-Brief. Housing and human-services amounts draw on a mix of general fund, bond, and program-income sources. Tax-cost examples are county tax only, on 2021 values (the schedule restored by the state freeze). Appeal status and deadlines: Buncombe County's property-appeal portal (taxappeal.buncombenc.gov) and County News Flash No. 1102 (August 14, 2026); UNC School of Government, Coates' Canons, July 8, 2026, for the reading that the act displaces the county's May 5, 2026 board adjournment for 2026 appeals while a 2027 appeal is still due by the 2027 adjournment date. Rate amendment: Buncombe County's amended FY2026-2027 budget ordinance, adopted by the Board of Commissioners at a special meeting on July 14, 2026 (agenda packet and minutes; reported the same day in County News Flash No. 1049), setting the FY2027 rates on 2021 values (county 61.54¢, Unified Fire District 17.38¢, Asheville City Schools 11.75¢) after SB 889/SB 474; Mountain Xpress and Public Radio East, July 15, 2026. SNAP administrative cost shift: Buncombe County News Flash No. 933 (April 28, 2026), estimating about $2 million in lost FY2027 SNAP administrative revenue under HB1; NCDHHS "H.R. 1 FNS County Admin Impact Table" (final, December 19, 2025), which annualizes Buncombe's full-year cost at about $2.84 million once the federal administrative match cut from 50 to 25 percent is fully in effect (county fiscal year 2028, July 2027 through June 2028). State benefit-cost penalty (a state cost, not a county one): the 2025 budget law (P.L. 119-21) ties a state's SNAP benefit share to its payment error rate, from nothing to 15 percent, beginning with federal fiscal year 2028, which starts October 1, 2027. The $150 million first-year figure is the NC General Assembly Fiscal Research Division's estimate on federal FY2024-25 error data (Fiscal Note SFN257v7, July 7, 2026), and it supersedes an earlier derived $140 million; the $420 million ceiling is the 15 percent tier applied to North Carolina's roughly $2.8 billion annual benefit base and remains a derived, illustrative figure rather than an official estimate. State error rate 7.36 percent for FY2025 (USDA FY2025 state payment error rates, June 24, 2026; NC Budget & Tax Center). Independent summary; not affiliated with Buncombe County. Updated July 4, 2026 to itemize the SNAP administrative cost shift and the state-level benefit-cost penalty; updated July 15, 2026 for the amended rate on 2021 values.