For most homes, the assessed value on a Penfield listing traces back to a town-wide reassessment completed in 2022. Since then the market has moved and the assessment roll has mostly stayed put. New York State now puts Penfield's level of assessment at 68 percent. That means a typical Penfield assessment is about two-thirds of what the state estimates the property is worth.
This matters most if you're comparing east-side towns. Perinton has revalued and assesses at full value. Pittsford assesses at about half. Penfield falls between them and has been sliding lower. If you line up assessed values across those three towns, you're comparing three different scales.
The gap opened quickly
The state measures how far a town's assessments have drifted with the equalization rate. Monroe County defines it as total assessed value divided by the state's estimate of total market value. Here is how Penfield's rate has moved:
| Year | Penfield state equalization rate | Source |
|---|---|---|
| 2024 | 87 | NYS 2024 Market Value Survey |
| 2026 | 75 | Monroe County 2026 equalization table |
That's a 12-point drop in two years. The roll hasn't been redone, so the drop reflects market values rising around assessments that didn't change.
The county's 2026 table also gives Penfield a level of assessment of 68, which is lower than its equalization rate of 75. The county describes the level of assessment as the percentage of full value at which properties are assessed. Both numbers point the same way. Penfield's assessments are well below current market value.
The town built it this way
None of this means something went wrong. The Penfield Assessor's revaluation page describes this drift as the normal cycle between reassessments:
"assessments are carried over from year to year and usually become, on average, a percent of Market Value other than 100%. The property tax rates are then adjusted annually to take into account the overall average percent deviation from market value."
The same page explains that a town-wide revaluation eventually resets assessments to 100 percent of market value. When that happens, tax rates are adjusted so the average property doesn't see a bigger-than-usual increase.
So the low assessments are balanced by the tax rate. When assessments drift down, the rate per thousand dollars of assessed value goes up to raise the same amount. On a single Penfield property, the assessment and the rate offset each other. They only cause trouble when you look at one of them alone or compare it with another town's.
What the same assessed figure means in each east-side town
Monroe County's 2026 table puts neighboring towns at very different points on this cycle.
| Town or village | 2026 state equalization rate | 2026 level of assessment |
|---|---|---|
| Perinton | 100 | 100 |
| Village of Fairport | 100 | 100 |
| Irondequoit | 84 | 74 |
| Penfield | 75 | 68 |
| Brighton | 59 | 53 |
| Pittsford | 57 | 51 |
To see what that does in practice, take a house assessed at $200,000 and divide by each town's 2026 level of assessment. These are town-wide averages, not an appraisal of any particular house:
- Perinton, at 100: about $200,000
- Penfield, at 68: about $294,000
- Pittsford, at 51: about $392,000
The same assessed figure points to three very different prices. A Penfield listing assessed below a Perinton listing could easily be the more expensive house.
Perinton shows how quickly this can change. The 2024 survey listed its equalization rate at 62. In 2026, after its revaluation, it's at 100. Pittsford went from 66 to 57 over the same period. Two years apart, the towns sit in a different order.
Within Penfield, some assessments are newer than others
The town-wide average doesn't apply evenly to every house. The Assessor's page notes that improvements, additions, and demolitions change an assessment between reassessments, because they change the property's description and so its market value.
On a single Penfield street, a house with a recent addition may have an assessment that was updated after 2022, while the unchanged house next door still carries its 2022 figure. The state also says equalization rates describe a whole municipality and say nothing about whether any one property is fairly assessed.
If you're weighing two Penfield homes, it helps to know which one has been altered since the 2022 reassessment, because that can account for a gap between their assessments.
Prices kept rising, and Penfield isn't adding many homes
The drift follows the regional market. In Q3 2026, the median sale price in Monroe County was $312,000, up 11.0 percent from Q3 2025, according to the New York State Association of Realtors quarterly report. The county closed 2,225 sales that quarter, down 1.7 percent, with 1.2 months of supply. For a sense of where Penfield started, the Greater Rochester Association of Realtors reported a full-year 2022 median sale price of $320,000 in Penfield, the year of the reassessment.
Penfield's construction pipeline is small. On the town's property under review list, the residential projects are a few small subdivisions:
- Bramble Ridge, Section 4, approved, divides 30.014 acres at 35 Apollonia Lane into five lots, including three new single-family homes.
- Ocwieja Subdivision, under review, is a proposed five-lot cluster on 5.60 acres at 1523 Jackson Road.
- Olivas Subdivision, under review, is a proposed three-lot single-family subdivision at 1573 Creek Street.
The largest recent proposal didn't go forward. A market-rate apartment project at 47 Willow Pond Way would have added two buildings with 88 units. The Planning Board granted preliminary site-plan approval on November 14, 2024, and the applicant withdrew on March 27, 2025, according to the town's application record.
For a buyer, this means most Penfield purchases are resales. Most of those homes carry an assessment that was last set in 2022, and the market has kept moving away from it.
What to compare instead
Because the assessment and the tax rate offset each other, the useful number is the tax bill. The Assessor's page links to the Monroe County Real Property Portal, which lists assessments, property data, and recent tax bills.
Before you compare Penfield with another east-side town, it helps to pull:
- The property's most recent actual tax bills, not its assessed value
- The property's assessment history, to see whether it changed after 2022
- The same two items for the house you're comparing it with in Perinton, Pittsford, or elsewhere
The town portion of the bill is set during the fall budget cycle. Penfield's preliminary 2027 budget, presented October 21, totals $29,712,500. Citizen Portal reported a proposed property tax levy of about $10.1 million. The town's budget schedule sets final adoption for November 18.
A few questions we hear often
Does a 68 percent level of assessment mean a Penfield home is underassessed? Not on its own. The 68 is a town-wide average, and the tax rate is set to account for it. The state says equalization rates don't establish whether any particular home is fairly assessed.
Why does the county table show two different numbers for Penfield? The equalization rate of 75 is the state's ratio of total assessed value to total market value. The level of assessment of 68 is the percentage of full value at which properties are assessed. They are separate measures, and both are on Monroe County's equalization page.
What if an owner believes their assessment doesn't match the market? The Penfield Assessor's revaluation page describes the town's review process and links to the state's grievance materials. This post is general information, not legal or tax advice. The Penfield Assessor's Office, an attorney, or a tax professional can speak to your own situation.
If you're comparing a Penfield home with one in Perinton or Pittsford and the numbers don't make sense, we're glad to pull both tax histories and go through them with you. Contact Bonnie Pagano and we'll start with the actual tax bills.
