Soraida and U.S. Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Chicago) once paid $275 per year in property taxes on a $340,000 home in Bucktown. | Illinois Secretary of State
Soraida and U.S. Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Chicago) once paid $275 per year in property taxes on a $340,000 home in Bucktown. | Illinois Secretary of State
This Wednesday, U.S. Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Chicago) will mark 19 years since he was caught paying just $274.42 in property taxes on his Bucktown, single-family home at 2132 W. Cortland Avenue, worth an estimated $340,000 at the time.
That's $531,000 in today's dollars.
Gutierrez sold the home in 1999 for $500,000 ($735,000 in 2017 dollars).
The home is valued today at $846,000 by Zillow.com. Its tax bill today is $13,030, 47 times what Gutierrez was paying.
Gutierrez' sweet deal was revealed by Chicago Tribune columnist John Kass, who wrote that then- Cook County Assessor Jim Houlihan had his home classified as a vacant lot.
He wrote that a similar house next door had a $5,000 property tax bill.
The home has appreciated 60 percent in value since 1998; its property tax bill has grown 260 percent.
The personal finances of Gutierrez, first elected to Congress in 1992, remain in the news.
A published report last week charged Gutierrez with paying his wife, Soraida, $400,000 in campaign funds. Before joining her husband's campaign staff, she formerly worked as a lobbyist in Springfield for Banco Popular.
In 2009, Gutierrez himself lobbied the federal government for a bailout of Banco Popular, based in Puerto Rico.
He succeeded; the bank received $935 million from taxpayers in 2009. It paid it back five years later.
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