Property Taxes at North Topsail Beach: Two Bills and a Pending Decision
North Topsail Beach property owners pay two separate tax bills -- one to the Town, one to Onslow County -- and as of mid-2026, the town side of that equation carried two different possible rates depending on a still-unresolved state-level decision about the county's revaluation timeline. This page walks through what's actually confirmed, what's pending, and what a buyer should verify directly before assuming a number.
Two Governments, Two Bills, One Parcel
Every property in North Topsail Beach is taxed by two separate governments: the Town of North Topsail Beach itself, and Onslow County, which funds county services and schools across the whole county, not just this town. The two bills are calculated against the same assessed value but set independently by two different elected bodies, and they're typically combined into a single mailed bill for convenience even though the underlying rates are set separately.
This structure is standard for an incorporated North Carolina beach town inside a larger county. What's less standard, and worth understanding in real detail, is that the town's own rate for the coming fiscal year wasn't settled as of this research pass -- it was explicitly contingent on a decision outside the town's control.
The Town's Confirmed 2025 Rate: 43 Cents Per $100
North Topsail Beach's town property tax rate was 43 cents ($0.430) per $100 of assessed value for 2025, per Onslow County's own published tax-rate schedule. That figure is the confirmed baseline this page treats as reliable for any calculation involving the 2025 tax year.
For a concrete illustration only: a property assessed at $525,000 (roughly this market's 2026 median sale price per Redfin) would owe approximately $2,258 in town-only tax at the 43-cent rate, calculated as $525,000 ÷ 100 × $0.43. That is this page's own arithmetic on one confirmed rate, offered as an illustration -- not a substitute for an actual bill, which depends on the property's current assessed value, not its sale price.
The 2026-27 Question: 33 Cents or 43 Cents, Pending a State Decision
Port City Daily's June 2026 coverage of North Topsail Beach's budget process described the town's draft FY2026-27 budget as carrying two contingency tax rates rather than one settled number: roughly 33 cents per $100 if Onslow County's countywide property revaluation proceeds on its expected schedule, and the same 43 cents held flat if a state-level decision delays that revaluation. The reporting framed this explicitly as the town's budget 'hinging' on a decision at the state level, with the town's own budget deadline looming while that outside decision remained unresolved.
This is a genuinely live, unsettled situation as of this research pass, not a confirmed final rate this page is willing to state as fact for the coming fiscal year. A prospective buyer should ask the Town of North Topsail Beach directly which rate is now in effect, since it may have been resolved by the time this page is read.
Onslow County's Rate and the 2026 Reappraisal
Onslow County's own base countywide property tax rate was 65.5 cents ($0.655) per $100 of assessed value for fiscal year 2025-26. Separately, property-tax analytics site Ownwell's trend data describes the county's 2026 reappraisal cycle producing countywide increases in roughly the 35%-40% range, with North Topsail Beach parcels specifically reported up around 35.6%. This page flags Ownwell explicitly as a third-party analytics firm rather than a primary county filing, though the described scale of increase is broadly consistent with revaluation cycles reported at other fast-growing coastal North Carolina counties around the same period.
This page does not add the town rate and the county rate together into a single 'combined rate' figure, because the town-side number for the coming fiscal year wasn't itself settled as of this research pass -- doing that arithmetic on an unconfirmed number would produce a false sense of precision.
Why the Revaluation Timing Question Matters So Much Here
A revaluation-timing dispute matters more in North Topsail Beach than in a lot of other NC beach towns because of how directly this town's budget is tied to its shoreline-protection spending -- a portion of the town's own property tax revenue feeds the Shoreline Protection Fund that pays for beach nourishment, on top of the accommodations tax and parking-revenue shares that also fund it (covered in more depth on this site's Real Cost of Ownership and Beach Erosion Reality pages). A lower post-revaluation rate applied to a much higher assessed value base, versus a flat pre-revaluation rate applied to the old base, can produce materially different total dollars flowing into that fund depending on which scenario plays out -- which is part of why this was a genuinely contested budget question rather than a routine formality.
This page does not speculate about which scenario is more likely to happen, or what the state-level decision driving the delay actually was, because that wasn't independently confirmed in this research pass beyond the Port City Daily headline framing it as a pending state decision.
What a Buyer Should Actually Do
Before making an offer on any North Topsail Beach property, pull the parcel's current assessed value and the actual current combined tax bill directly from the Onslow County Tax Office -- not from a real estate listing site, which may show a stale figure calculated against the wrong rate. Ask specifically whether the FY2026-27 revaluation timing question has been resolved and which town rate is now in effect, since this page's research found it unresolved as of mid-2026.
This page does not state a property tax proration formula for a mid-year closing, nor does it state current eligibility details for any North Carolina homestead, elderly/disabled, or circuit-breaker property tax relief program that might apply to a North Topsail Beach owner -- North Carolina does maintain statewide programs along these lines, but this page did not independently verify their current income thresholds or application process, and does not want to publish a stale or approximate eligibility figure as though it were current. Ask the Onslow County Tax Office directly about any relief program you might qualify for.
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Get a Free Agent Referral →Independent research. No ads. No sponsored listings. Data sourced from: Onslow County's own published 2025 tax-rate schedule for the confirmed 43-cent town rate and the confirmed 65.5-cent countywide rate for FY2025-26; Port City Daily's June 2026 reporting on North Topsail Beach's FY2026-27 budget process and its two contingency tax-rate scenarios pending a state-level revaluation-timing decision; and Ownwell's property-tax trend data for the described 2026 Onslow County reappraisal percentage increases, flagged as an analytics-firm estimate. The $525,000-home illustrative tax calculation is this page's own arithmetic on one confirmed rate, not a published combined figure. Facts not independently confirmed and not invented here include: the final settled FY2026-27 town tax rate; the specific nature of the state-level decision affecting the county's revaluation timeline; any fire district, school, or special district levy that might apply to a specific North Topsail Beach parcel; and current eligibility details for any North Carolina homestead, elderly/disabled, or circuit-breaker property tax relief program. Confirm all current figures and eligibility directly with the Onslow County Tax Office and the Town of North Topsail Beach before making a purchase decision. Nothing on this page is tax or legal advice.