Township in Eastern Ontario, inside Prescott and Russell UCo
Russell property tax rate, 2025
1.25%of the assessed value on your MPAC notice, each year
$6,240 a yearon a $500,000 home, or about $520 a month
Lower than 66% of the 414 Ontario municipalities
Each dot is one municipality, placed by its newest filed rate. Further right is higher.
Russell 1.25%
Middle 1.40%10 more, up to 6.85%
0.5%1.0%1.5%2.0%2.5%3.0%
Russell
Middle 1.40%10 more, to 6.85%
0.5%1.0%1.5%2.0%2.5%3.0%
Lowest fifth
Low
Middle fifth
High
Highest fifth
Russell
Russell in short
$6,240 a year on a $500,000 home: $3,081 to Russell council, $2,394 to Prescott and Russell UCo and $765 to schools.
Up 0.18 points since 2019, or $925 a year more on a $500,000 home.
Rent $1,240 a month, home value $552,000 in the 2021 Census, against an Ontario middle of $980 and $400,000.
2025 is the newest year Russell has filed. Every municipality on this site is compared at its
newest filed rate: 283 have filed 2025, and the other 131 are at their newest year, mostly 2024.
Who sets the rate
Three bodies set Russell's rate: Russell council at 0.62%, Prescott and Russell UCo at
0.48%, and the Province of Ontario for schools. The county portion is
38% of the bill, set by a council you vote for separately.
$3,081$2,394$765
Portion
Rate
On $500,000
Share
MunicipalRussell council
0.62%
$3,081
49%
County or regionPrescott and Russell UCo
0.48%
$2,394
38%
EducationProvince of Ontario
0.15%
$765
12%
Total
1.25%
$6,240
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 2019. Since 2019 the total rate here has risen by 0.18 percentage points, from 1.06% to 1.25%. On a $500,000 home that is $925 a year more than in 2019.
20191.06%$5,315
20201.07%$5,327
20211.08%$5,406
20221.11%$5,543
20231.15%$5,734
20241.19%$5,949
2025*1.25%$6,240
Total residential rate, with the tax on a $500,000 home underneath. *2025 is Russell'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 $2,006M to
$2,693M, and the residential levy collected went from $21M
to $34M. 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
0.49%
0.41%
0.16%
1.06%
—
$5,315
2020
0.50%
0.41%
0.15%
1.07%
+0.00 pts
$5,327
2021
0.51%
0.41%
0.15%
1.08%
+0.02 pts
$5,406
2022
0.53%
0.43%
0.15%
1.11%
+0.03 pts
$5,543
2023
0.55%
0.44%
0.15%
1.15%
+0.04 pts
$5,734
2024
0.57%
0.46%
0.15%
1.19%
+0.04 pts
$5,949
2025*
0.62%
0.48%
0.15%
1.25%
+0.06 pts
$6,240
Why are Russell property taxes so low?
Russell's total rate of 1.25% is 0.15 percentage points below the provincial middle (1.40%), which is not the same as a small bill. The taxable value is large next to what the budget must cover — $2.69B of residential value funds $33.6M in levy here — so a lower percentage raises enough, and the dollar amount on an expensive house can still be high.
Home values
Homes here are assessed at $320,315 per household, 17% more than the middle ($274,250). Higher values let it raise the same money per household at a lower rate.
Spending
It spends $5,452 per household, 26% more than the middle ($4,313). It spends more on social and family services (+$521), water and wastewater (+$365) and roads and bridges (+$184), and less on running the municipality (−$150) and fire (−$65).
← Less than the middleMore than the middle →
Social and family services+$521
Water and wastewater+$365
Roads and bridges+$184
Running the municipality−$150
Fire−$65
More on why
Who gets the money
Of that rate, 0.48% goes to Prescott and Russell UCo and 0.15% to schools; 0.62% is set by Russell itself.
Provincial money
Social services and social housing are partly paid for by provincial transfers, so they do not map one-to-one onto the tax bill.
Across Ontario
Across the 241 towns inside a county or region, the tax rate follows home values much more closely than spending: where homes are worth more, rates tend to be lower (rank correlation −0.70 for home values, 0.45 for spending). A pattern, not proof of cause.
What it costs to live in Russell
Cost
Russell
Ontario middle
Rent, per monthmedian, 2021
$1,240Higher than 85% of 354
$980
Home valueowners’ estimate, 2021
$552,000Higher than 72% of 412
$400,000
Property tax on a $500,000 assessment2025
$6,240Lower than 66% of 414
$6,992
Households spending 30% or more on housingshare of income, 2021
11.8%Lower than 76% of 400
15.0%
Household incomemedian, before tax, 2020
$123,000Higher than 96% of 405
$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 Russell
The 5 places closest to Russell on total tax rate, assessment / household, spending per household, population, 5-year growth, people per household, among towns inside a county or region.
Residential is one of 11 classes Russell 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
2.446892
1.51%
1.17%
0.88%
3.56%
Aggregate Extraction Property
1.991052
1.23%
0.95%
0.51%
2.69%
Commercial
1.440999
0.89%
0.69%
0.88%
2.46%
Parking Lot
1.440999
0.89%
0.69%
0.88%
2.46%
Shopping Centre
1.440999
0.89%
0.69%
0.88%
2.46%
Pipeline
1.415789
0.87%
0.68%
0.88%
2.43%
Multi-Residential
1
0.62%
0.48%
0.15%
1.25%
New Multi-Residential
1
0.62%
0.48%
0.15%
1.25%
Residential
1
0.62%
0.48%
0.15%
1.25%
Farmland
0.25
0.15%
0.12%
0.04%
0.31%
Managed Forest
0.25
0.15%
0.12%
0.04%
0.31%
Sources and method
Tax rates and spending come from the Financial Information Return that Russell 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 Russell's 2025 total
residential rate with all 414 Ontario municipalities: 273 of the other 413 charge more. The five colours split them into fifths.
Municipality ID
MunID 02048, MAH 67611
Limits
These are the figures Russell 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.