Longport, NJ: Property Tax Guide

A Decade-Long Lawsuit Over a Tax Bill: The Seaview Harbor Secession Saga

Seaview Harbor is a waterfront subdivision built in the 1960s, technically located within Egg Harbor Township, comprising 92 homes with private docks plus a restaurant and marina with 300 boat slips, with a combined assessed value of roughly $100 million. Beginning around 2014, Seaview Harbor's property owners petitioned to secede from Egg Harbor Township entirely and join Longport Borough instead. Their stated reason was not schools, not services, not local identity -- it was a documented, dramatic property-tax differential. Court evidence in the case showed that a $1 million home would face roughly $31,400 per year in property taxes in Egg Harbor Township, versus roughly $9,800 per year in Longport -- a difference of more than $21,000 a year on a single home, and proportionally larger across all 92 properties in the enclave.

Egg Harbor Township's Township Committee denied the secession petition in 2016. Seaview Harbor did not stop there: a trial judge ruled against the secession in February 2020, the New Jersey Appellate Division affirmed that ruling in a 48-page opinion in December 2021 -- finding that deannexation would cause "the loss of social and economic diversity" and cost Egg Harbor Township roughly $2.3 million in annual tax revenue, projected to force a 5.9-cent tax-rate increase on the township's remaining residents -- and the New Jersey Supreme Court denied further appeal shortly after, ending eight years of litigation with Seaview Harbor remaining part of Egg Harbor Township. Whether Seaview Harbor pursued any further legal or legislative avenue after that denial is not confirmed here; treat the case as closed as of the Supreme Court's denial.

The case is worth understanding in detail because it is a rare, real-world, court-tested illustration of just how much a municipal boundary line can matter to a New Jersey property tax bill -- and how seriously affluent property owners can take that difference. Ninety-two households and a marina operator did not spend roughly a decade in litigation, through a township committee denial, a trial, an appellate opinion, and a state Supreme Court petition, over a trivial sum. They did it because, per the evidence entered into that record, the gap between an Egg Harbor Township bill and a Longport bill on an otherwise identical home was large enough to justify years of legal fees to try to close it.

Why a Municipal Line Can Move a Tax Bill This Much: Assessed Value and the Municipal Budget

New Jersey property tax is not a single flat statewide rate applied to a home's price. Each municipality -- Egg Harbor Township and Longport Borough alike -- sets its own local tax rate based on what its own municipal budget, its own share of county costs, and its own local school district funding actually require in a given year, then divides that total levy across the assessed value of every taxable property within its own borders. A home's assessed value (which New Jersey's statewide assessment and equalization framework is meant to keep reasonably aligned with market value, at least in principle) is only half the equation; the other half is the total budget that the town, the county, and the school district need to raise through the property tax, and how many other properties and how much total assessed value that levy gets divided across.

That is the structural reason the Seaview Harbor evidence could show such a wide gap between two towns separated only by a boundary line, with no difference in the physical home itself. A township with a larger population, more services, more infrastructure, and a different tax base composition can end up needing to raise a proportionally larger levy per dollar of assessed value than a small, geographically compact borough like Longport does. None of this page's discussion of that mechanism should be read as stating what Egg Harbor Township's or Longport's current rate actually is today -- the $31,400/$9,800 figures came from litigation evidence in a specific case and are not dated to a specific current tax year beyond that case record. They illustrate the mechanism; they are not this year's numbers.

Longport's Own Documented Tax Standing: The 2018 Figure

Separate from the Seaview Harbor litigation, Longport has its own independently confirmed tax history. Longport ranked 22nd among New Jersey's most expensive ZIP codes in 2018, with a median home sale price of $767,500 in 2017, and its average property tax bill reached $10,872 in 2018 -- the highest average bill in Atlantic County that year. That figure sits somewhat oddly next to the Seaview Harbor evidence's roughly $9,800 figure for a $1 million Longport home from the same general era, and the two are not presented here as reconciled or perfectly consistent -- they come from different sources (one a countywide average-bill comparison, the other litigation evidence tied to a specific hypothetical home value) and should be read as two separate, real, historical data points rather than a single unified rate.

Both numbers describe a town where property values, and the tax bills that follow from them, have historically run high relative to many of Longport's neighbors on Absecon Island and across Atlantic County. Neither number is current. 2018 is now eight years in the past as of this writing, township and county budgets are set annually, and neither figure should be treated as what a Longport property owner would actually be billed today.

What This Page Does Not State, and Why

In the interest of not guessing at figures that change year to year and that only the taxing authorities themselves can state accurately: this page does not give a current Longport municipal tax rate, a current Egg Harbor Township tax rate for comparison, a current Atlantic County tax rate, a current school-tax component, a current assessment ratio or methodology, a current typical assessed value, a current typical annual tax bill, a specific New Jersey state sales tax rate, or the specifics of any current exemption or credit program. The $10,872 average bill is a confirmed 2018 figure, and the $31,400/$9,800 comparison is confirmed litigation evidence undated to a specific tax year beyond the case record -- neither is restated here as a current number.

Current population figures beyond the 2020 census count of 893, current median home prices, and current listing counts are also outside the scope of what this page states as fact. Anything you encounter elsewhere describing a specific current Longport property tax rate, assessment figure, or New Jersey sales tax rate should be verified directly with the sources below before you rely on it for a purchase, renovation, or budgeting decision.

Where to Confirm Current Figures

For the current Atlantic County property tax rate and a specific parcel's assessed value, contact Atlantic County government directly, or check its published assessment and tax rate materials; the county is the authoritative source for the county layer that applies to every property within it, including Longport. For the current Borough of Longport municipal tax rate and any school-tax component that applies within the borough, contact the Borough of Longport's own finance office directly, since the borough administers its own municipal rate and billing independently of the county and independently of neighboring Egg Harbor Township. For the State of New Jersey's current sales tax rate and any applicable exemptions, consult the State of New Jersey's own tax authority directly rather than relying on a figure from another state's market on this site. For how a specific parcel's classification, use, or location on Absecon Island may affect its assessment, contact the Borough of Longport's assessor or finance office directly, before assuming a listing description, this page's historical figures, or the Seaview Harbor case tells you anything about a specific property's current tax treatment.

A Professional-Consult Disclaimer

Property tax rates, assessment methods, exemption programs, and sales tax rates change over time and are set by Atlantic County, the Borough of Longport, and the State of New Jersey, not by this site. Nothing on this page is legal, tax, financial, or zoning advice. Before making a purchase, budgeting a tax bill, or relying on any figure describing Longport property tax, confirm current numbers directly with Atlantic County government, the Borough of Longport finance office, the State of New Jersey, or a qualified New Jersey tax professional.