The Oregon system started out with good intentions but ended up being devilishly complicated to understand and unfair to many people. It's probably a great case study in the long-term unintended consequences of laws intended to control real estate taxes.
The Deschutes (Oregon) County Tax Assessor's office made a really good video explaining how three almost identical houses in the same location can have completely different tax bills:
In addition to what the video says, I wanted to point out that the 3% hard annual cap you mention is only on the property's Maximum Assessed Value, which is only one of the many inputs into the computation for a property's tax bill. For example, one thing that can cause taxes to go up more than 3% are general bonds approved by voter measure.
Portland Commissioner Steve Novick also wrote a really good article about all of the problems with Oregon's tax system and made some recommendations:
The Deschutes (Oregon) County Tax Assessor's office made a really good video explaining how three almost identical houses in the same location can have completely different tax bills:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fo_hSySAC2A
In addition to what the video says, I wanted to point out that the 3% hard annual cap you mention is only on the property's Maximum Assessed Value, which is only one of the many inputs into the computation for a property's tax bill. For example, one thing that can cause taxes to go up more than 3% are general bonds approved by voter measure.
Portland Commissioner Steve Novick also wrote a really good article about all of the problems with Oregon's tax system and made some recommendations:
https://www.portlandoregon.gov/novick/article/428020