Senior Tax Freeze

St. Louis County Senior Real PropertyTax Freeze: An adventure. This is the skinny. Required - you must be 62, live in the house, and have certain documents. You cannot do it online despite rumors. You must go to a STL County tax office -North, West, South or Clayton. Clayton requires an appointment while the others take walk-ins. They are closed for lunch from 12:00-12:30 and stop admitting people at 4:00. Everyone is congenial. Take a lawn chair in case there is a line. Google sent me to the West county office. Going south on Clarkson you turn on a marked road but the first turn right is NOT marked. This takes you in the back way into a shopping center with the tiny office. The door is locked. Inside there are six chairs for seniors, four workers at desks, a nice Greeter, and a superviser who takes money if you need to pay for a Title ($4). The workers are friendly. You must have Original Documents: Drivers License, Locator Number (from the computer or your tax bill), Deed, and Trust (and ammendments there to). They take your Deed and print you out a Title and keep a copy for the application. They take the trust apart and copy the required pages and put the trust back together. You sign the application which has print that is too small to read. They return your papers and a copy of your application which shows a website to follow the process.
You get to re-apply yearly for five years after which the program might be changed or even discontinued.
When I came to the office last week I did not have my original Trust documents so I had the opportunity to return for a second time. I arrived then at five minutes to noon and got to stand in line for 35 minutes with a great group of very nice folks.