1.41%of the assessed value on your MPAC notice, each year
$7,059 a yearon a $500,000 home, or about $588 a month
Higher than 53% of the 283 Ontario municipalities that have filed 2025
Each dot is one municipality, placed by its 2025 rate. Further right is higher. The rest file 2025 later in the year.
Barrie 1.41%
Middle 1.39%4 more, up to 4.40%
0.5%1.0%1.5%2.0%2.5%3.0%
Barrie
Middle 1.39%4 more, to 4.40%
0.5%1.0%1.5%2.0%2.5%3.0%
Lowest fifth
Low
Middle fifth
High
Highest fifth
Barrie
Barrie in short
$7,059 a year on a $500,000 home: $6,294 to Barrie council and $765 to schools.
Up 0.18 points since 2019, or $896 a year more on a $500,000 home.
Rent $1,510 a month, home value $695,000 in the 2021 Census, against an Ontario middle of $980 and $400,000.
2025 is the newest year Barrie has filed, so this page uses it.
283 of Ontario’s 386 municipalities have filed 2025 so far, and Barrie is compared with them.
In 2024, when all of them had filed, Barrie was higher than 51% at 1.35%.
Who sets the rate
Two bodies set Barrie's rate: Barrie council and the Province of Ontario, for schools. Barrie has no
county above it, so there is no county or region portion: its own rate of 1.26%
already pays for services that a county would run elsewhere. That is also why comparing Barrie's
municipal rate directly against a township's understates what the township actually pays.
$6,294$765
Portion
Rate
On $500,000
Share
MunicipalBarrie council
1.26%
$6,294
89%
County or regionNone in Barrie
0.00%
$0
0%
EducationProvince of Ontario
0.15%
$765
11%
Total
1.41%
$7,059
100%
Each rate is rounded to two decimals, so the parts can add up to 0.01 off the total.
How the rate has changed, 2019–2025
Up every year since 2020. Since 2019 the total rate here has risen by 0.18 percentage points, from 1.23% to 1.41%. On a $500,000 home that is $896 a year more than in 2019.
20191.23%$6,162
20201.21%$6,051
20211.22%$6,095
20221.25%$6,274
20231.29%$6,456
20241.35%$6,767
2025*1.41%$7,059
Total residential rate, with the tax on a $500,000 home underneath. *2025 is Barrie's own filing; 104 municipalities have not filed 2025 yet.Each part of the rate, year by year
Over the same years the residential assessment base moved from $16,764M to
$18,599M, and the residential levy collected went from $196M
to $263M. A rate rising while the base also grows means the budget grew faster than
property values; a rate falling while the base grows usually means the opposite. Assessment is the figure on the
MPAC notice, still based on 2016 values province-wide.
Year
Municipal
County or region
Education
Total
Change
On $500,000
2019
1.07%
—
0.16%
1.23%
—
$6,162
2020
1.06%
—
0.15%
1.21%
−0.02 pts
$6,051
2021
1.07%
—
0.15%
1.22%
+0.01 pts
$6,095
2022
1.10%
—
0.15%
1.25%
+0.04 pts
$6,274
2023
1.14%
—
0.15%
1.29%
+0.04 pts
$6,456
2024
1.20%
—
0.15%
1.35%
+0.06 pts
$6,767
2025*
1.26%
—
0.15%
1.41%
+0.06 pts
$7,059
Why are Barrie property taxes so high?
They are not, measured against the rest of the province. Barrie's total rate of 1.41% sits close to the Ontario middle of 1.39%: higher than 53% of 283 municipalities. A bill can still feel high when the assessment is high, because the rate is only half of the calculation.
Home values
Homes here are assessed at $299,390 per household, 64% more than the middle ($182,514). Higher values let it raise the same money per household at a lower rate.
Spending
It spends $7,946 per household, 10% more than the middle ($7,212). It spends more on police (+$927), fire (+$392) and public transit (+$371), and less on roads and bridges (−$703) and running the municipality (−$152).
← Less than the middleMore than the middle →
Police+$927
Fire+$392
Public transit+$371
Roads and bridges−$703
Running the municipality−$152
More on why
Across Ontario
Across the 154 places with no county above them, the tax rate follows home values much more closely than spending: where homes are worth more, rates tend to be lower (rank correlation −0.82 for home values, 0.57 for spending). A pattern, not proof of cause.
What it costs to live in Barrie
Cost
Barrie
Ontario middle
Rent, per monthmedian, 2021
$1,510Higher than 94% of 329
$980
Home valueowners’ estimate, 2021
$695,000Higher than 83% of 384
$400,000
Property tax on a $500,000 assessment2025
$7,059Higher than 53% of 283
$6,964
Households spending 30% or more on housingshare of income, 2021
26.8%Higher than 97% of 373
14.9%
Household incomemedian, before tax, 2020
$93,000Higher than 65% of 377
$84,000
Ontario has no official cost-of-living index for single towns. Statistics Canada’s consumer price index covers only Toronto, Ottawa and Thunder Bay here, and it measures change over time, not the gap between places. These are the costs published for each municipality: what renters paid and owners estimated in the 2021 Census, not today’s asking rents or sale prices.
Places like Barrie
The 5 places closest to Barrie on total tax rate, assessment / household, spending per household, population, 5-year growth, people per household, among places with no county above them.
Municipalities that share Barrie's county or district that have filed 2025. Rates compare most cleanly between places whose assessments sit at similar levels.
Residential is one of 13 classes Barrie reported this year. The tax ratio is the multiple
applied to the residential rate: a ratio of 1.7 on multi-residential means an apartment building pays 1.7×
what a house pays on the same assessed value.
Class
Tax ratio
Municipal
County or region
Education
Total
Industrial
1.516328
1.91%
—
0.88%
2.79%
Large Industrial
1.516328
1.91%
—
0.88%
2.79%
Commercial
1.433126
1.80%
—
0.88%
2.68%
Office Building
1.433126
1.80%
—
0.88%
2.68%
Parking Lot
1.433126
1.80%
—
0.88%
2.68%
Shopping Centre
1.433126
1.80%
—
0.88%
2.68%
Pipeline
1.103939
1.39%
—
0.88%
2.27%
Aggregate Extraction Property
1.233846
1.55%
—
0.05%
1.60%
Multi-Residential
1
1.26%
—
0.15%
1.41%
New Multi-Residential
1
1.26%
—
0.15%
1.41%
Residential
1
1.26%
—
0.15%
1.41%
Farmland
0.25
0.31%
—
0.04%
0.35%
Managed Forest
0.25
0.31%
—
0.04%
0.35%
Sources and method
Tax rates and spending come from the Financial Information Return that Barrie files with the Province of Ontario; population, rents and home values from Statistics Canada.
Every source, the method and the limits
Tax rates
Ontario Financial Information Return (FIR), 22 GPL — Municipal and School Board Taxation. Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing, Municipal Act s.294(1). Years 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025; retrieved 2026-10-11.
Download the file
Spending, households
Financial Information Return Schedule 40 (consolidated expenses by function) and Schedule 02 (households and population).
Population
Adapted from Statistics Canada, Table 17-10-0155-01, Population estimates, July 1, by census subdivision. This does not constitute an endorsement by Statistics Canada of this product.
Statistics Canada Open Licence.
Rent, home value, income
Adapted from Statistics Canada, Census Profile, 2021 Census of Population. This does not constitute an endorsement by Statistics Canada of this product.
Statistics Canada Open Licence. Rent is the median monthly shelter cost of renter households (rent plus any utilities they pay).
The Ontario middle is the median across the municipalities with a published figure.
Method
Dollar figures are the rate times $500,000 of assessed value. Standing compares Barrie's 2025 total
residential rate with all 283 Ontario municipalities: 132 of the other 282 charge more. The five colours split them into fifths.
Municipality ID
MunID 43042, MAH 70101
Limits
These are the figures Barrie filed with the province. An individual bill can include area-specific charges and
local improvement levies that a municipality-wide rate does not capture. Reference, not tax advice.