Notre Dame Student Policy Network, in partnership with the Center for Land Economics | July 2026
From the Ground Up: An Analysis of Land Value Tax in Cincinnati, Ohio
Across Cincinnati, a large share of land sits vacant or underdeveloped, and Ohio's property tax is part of the reason. Because it taxes land and buildings at the same rate, a downtown parking lot can pay less than the apartment building next door, and any owner who builds or improves a property is rewarded with a higher tax bill.
Working with the Center for Land Economics, the Notre Dame Student Policy Network used parcel-level Hamilton County assessor data, merged with Census data, to model a revenue-neutral split-rate scenario in which land is taxed at four times the rate of buildings, applied to Cincinnati's 6.1-mill general operating levy. Revenue-neutral means the city collects the same total; the shift changes who pays, not how much the city takes in.
The result would stop penalizing the people who build and maintain property, push idle and speculative land back into use, and cut taxes for most Cincinnati homeowners and renters, all without reducing the revenue the city relies on.
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Key Findings
- •About $1.87 billion in land value, nearly one in five parcels, sits vacant or underdeveloped, much of it in the city's most valuable neighborhoods.
- •The median single-family homeowner pays less, with roughly half paying less and about one in four paying more.
- •Between 63% and 70% of multi-family parcels see tax cuts above 10%, with the median multi-family property saving about 16% to 17%.
- •Vacant parcels see a median tax increase of about 126%, and every vacant lot sees its bill rise more than 10%.
- •The burden shifts progressively: the lowest-income neighborhoods see median cuts near 17%, while only the highest-income quintile sees a median increase of about 11%.