Updated September 5, 2026. Quick answer: Oregon’s deferral caps household income at $70,000 and, less commonly noted, net worth at $500,000; charges 6% simple, non-compounding interest; and its lien is subordinate to any mortgage that was recorded before the deferral notice.
What Oregon’s deferral requires, including a net-worth cap easy to miss
Oregon’s Senior and Disabled Property Tax Deferral, ORS 311.666 through 311.701, opens to homeowners 62 or older, or disabled at any age, as of April 15 of the filing year. Household income is capped at $70,000 for 2026, a figure set directly by a 2025 law with cost-of-living indexing beginning for tax years starting July 1, 2027. Less commonly disclosed: the statute also imposes a net-worth cap of $500,000, separate from the income test. The home’s real market value is capped too, at a statutory floor of $250,000 or 150% to 250% of the county median value depending on years of occupancy, indexed from a 2021 base; the Department of Revenue’s current figure is $301,000 for 2026.
6% simple interest, and a lien that yields only to an older mortgage
Interest accrues at a flat 6% a year, and while the statute itself does not use the word ‘non-compounding,’ the Department of Revenue’s own guidance confirms directly that the 6% does not compound. On lien priority, Oregon’s deferral lien carries the same priority as an ordinary real-property tax lien; generally senior to almost everything; except that any mortgage, trust deed, or security interest recorded before the deferral notice keeps its priority ahead of the deferral lien. In practice that means an existing mortgage taken out before you deferred stays senior, but the deferral lien outranks anything recorded afterward, the same date-based logic Minnesota uses.
When it comes due, and how to apply
The balance becomes due on the death of the taxpayer or a surviving qualified spouse, on sale or transfer to someone who is not a qualifying claimant, when the property stops being the homestead (with an open-ended exception for a health-related absence such as a care facility, with no fixed grace period stated), or when a manufactured or floating home moves out of state; generally due by August 15 of the following year, or five days before removal for a moved home. Timely applications run January 1 through April 15 preceding the tax year, with a late window through December 1 for a fee. The statute requires DOR recertification of continued eligibility at least once every three years, though DOR’s current administrative practice is to recertify every two years; a disclosed gap between the statutory floor and current practice, both confirmed from primary sources.
Oregon’s broader senior property-tax picture, covering exemptions, freezes and circuit-breaker credits, not just the deferral: property tax breaks for seniors in Oregon.
How every state’s programme compares: property tax relief for seniors by state. What a deferral means in general, and who it catches out: the property-tax deferral lien trap.
Statutory text read at each state’s own legislature, revisor, or revenue agency this session. General information, not tax or legal advice; rates, caps and thresholds change most years and a county or state agency retains the final say on your own application.