Dover apartment operating costs are shaped by a handful of local line items that owners elsewhere in Delaware do not face in the same form: a city-owned electric, water and sewer utility, a city property tax still levied on 2020 assessments alongside county and school taxes on newer values, and an annual rental dwelling permit with inspections. On top of those sit statewide Landlord-Tenant Code rules that limit fees and deposits and add notice and disclosure duties.
Dover is Delaware’s capital and sits in Kent County. The U.S. Census Bureau counted 39,403 residents in 2020 and estimates 40,592 as of July 2025, and its 2020–2024 American Community Survey puts the owner-occupied rate at 46.9%, meaning roughly 53% of homes are rented, with a median gross rent of $1,344, according to Census QuickFacts for Dover. With rents at that level, each recurring cost below takes a meaningful share of a building’s income, so it pays to understand them line by line.
Dover apartment operating costs at a glance
For a typical apartment building inside city limits, the locally driven expenses fall into these groups:
- Property taxes paid to the City of Dover, Kent County and the school district, each with its own rate and, for now, two different assessment bases.
- Electricity for common areas, and for units if the owner pays, purchased from the city’s municipal utility.
- Water, sewer and trash, also billed by the city, with a county sewer charge passed through.
- Rental dwelling permits, renewed every year, with inspection and reinspection fees.
- Compliance costs created by the Delaware Landlord-Tenant Code, the state’s eviction right-to-representation law and a new statewide tenant guide.
- Insurance, including flood coverage for buildings in mapped flood zones.
Payroll, repairs and management fees matter just as much but are driven by the building rather than the city. The sections below focus on the costs that are specific to Dover and Delaware.
Property taxes on two different value bases
The most unusual feature of Dover’s tax picture is that the city and the county currently tax the same building on different assessments. Owners who budget by applying one combined rate to one value will get the wrong answer.
The City of Dover levy
According to the City of Dover tax office FAQ, city assessments are set at 100% of fair market value as of January 1, 2020, and the posted rate is $0.485 per $100 of assessed value. The city’s plan to close a $7 million gap in its $57.6 million fiscal 2027 budget, as reported by Spotlight Delaware in May 2026, included an increase of 3 cents per $100 of assessed value, so owners should confirm which rate appears on their current bill. Under Ordinance 2026-09, adopted June 8, 2026, the city will switch to Kent County’s new assessed values beginning in fiscal 2028, so the city rate will have to be set against a new base at that point.
At the posted rate, a building with a 2020 city assessment of $2,000,000 would owe about $9,700 a year in city tax. That figure is an illustration, but it shows the scale of the city portion relative to the county and school levies below.
Kent County and the Capital School District
Kent County’s reassessment was part of the court-ordered statewide reassessment of Delaware property. Its new values reflect fair market value as of July 1, 2023, and took effect for the fiscal 2025 bills mailed in August 2024, according to the county’s open letter on the reassessment. Because values rose, the county cut its own rate from 36 cents to 5.72 cents per $100 of assessed value, describing the change as revenue-neutral, and Levy Court kept 5.72 cents for fiscal 2026. Owners who disagreed with their new value could seek an informal review, then appeal to the Board of Assessment Review and, after that, to Superior Court.
School and other county-collected taxes ride on the same new values. The Kent County 2026–2027 tax rate chart lists a combined rate of 0.6272 for the Capital School District, which serves Dover, made up of:
- County: 0.0572
- Library: 0.0051
- Vocational-technical school district: 0.0292
- Capital School District: 0.5357
The chart does not label its unit, but the county component matches the 5.72 cents per $100 figure, so the combined rate is about 62.7 cents per $100 of county assessed value. A building with a county value of $2,500,000 would owe roughly $15,680 a year on that line before any city tax. The school district, not the county, is the largest piece.
Combining the two illustrations, a 24-unit building with a $2,000,000 city assessment and a $2,500,000 county value would carry about $25,380 a year in property taxes, or roughly $1,060 per unit. A gap between the two values is to be expected while the city still uses 2020 figures and the county uses 2023 figures, and it is the gap that will close when the city moves to county values. Owners should not assume the combined bill will stay flat through that transition, because each taxing body sets its rate against its own budget needs.
Electricity from a city-owned utility
Dover operates its own electric utility, so rates are set by the city rather than an investor-owned company. Under the City of Dover rates and tariffs effective July 1, 2026, residential Rate R carries a customer charge of $11.24 per bill and an energy charge of $0.1668 per kilowatt-hour, plus a Green Energy Fund rider of $0.000178 per kWh, and bills can also include a fuel adjustment charge. Common-area and house meters may be billed under a different schedule, so owners should check the tariff that applies to each meter.
The cost trend matters as much as the rate. Dover Electric proposed a $110 million fiscal 2027 budget that included $86 million for power purchases, and its director said energy expenses were about 11.5 times what they had been four years earlier, as reported by Delaware Public Media in June 2026. The fiscal 2027 budget plan added 1 cent per kWh, and for fiscal 2026 the average customer saw electric bills rise about $21 a month. For buildings where the owner pays electricity, whether for hallway lighting, laundry rooms or all-electric units on a single meter, this line has been one of the fastest-growing in the budget.
Water, sewer and trash charges in Dover
Water and sewer are also city services, and the sewer bill includes a county component. The July 1, 2026 tariff sets these inside-city charges:
- Water: a $5.60 customer charge, then $3.23 per 1,000 gallons for the first 6,000 gallons, $4.03 per 1,000 for 6,001 to 100,000 gallons and $4.84 per 1,000 above 100,000 gallons.
- Sewer: a $5.15 customer charge plus $3.35 per 1,000 gallons, a Kent County Sewer Adjustment of $4.24 per 1,000 gallons, which the county sets and can change, and a Ground Water Inflow Adjustment of $1.90 per 1,000 gallons.
- Trash: a flat $33.00 for service inside city limits, listed in a table dated July 1, 2024.
Sewer is the larger half of the bill: once the county and inflow adjustments are added, volumetric sewer charges total $9.49 per 1,000 gallons, more than double the second-tier water rate. As an illustration, a master-metered 24-unit building using 72,000 gallons in a billing cycle would pay about $291 for water and $688 for sewer, or roughly $979 in total. Over a year that comes to about $11,750, or close to $490 per unit. Actual use varies widely with fixtures, occupancy and leaks, which is why low-flow fixtures and prompt leak repair pay off quickly in Dover.
Water rates have also been rising, with the average customer seeing about $4 a month more in fiscal 2026. Owners who bill back water and sewer to residents should make sure their lease terms and allocation method are clear and consistent with the Landlord-Tenant Code.
Rental dwelling permits and inspections
Every rental unit in Dover requires a city rental dwelling permit. The current application lists these annual fees:
- Apartment building: $200 for the first three units plus $50 for each additional unit.
- Single-family home, duplex or townhouse: $200 per unit.
- Condominium: $75.
- Short-term rental: $200.
For a 24-unit building, that works out to $1,250 a year. The application requires proof of insurance. Under Ordinance 2022-14, which restructured the program, permits are annual and expire January 31, an inspection is required before a new permit is issued, reinspections cost $100 each, late fees run 10% of the license fee per month, owners who live outside Kent County must designate a local agent, and unpaid fees can become a lien on the property. The permit fee itself is modest; the real cost lies in failed inspections, which add reinspection fees and the repairs needed to pass.
Landlord-Tenant Code limits that affect the budget
Delaware’s Residential Landlord-Tenant Code caps several revenue items and sets rules that carry administrative costs. Chapter 55 of Title 25, available on the state’s Delaware Code website, provides that:
- A security deposit may not exceed one month’s rent for an unfurnished unit on a lease of one year or more. It must be held in an escrow account at a federally insured bank with a Delaware office and returned within 20 days after the tenancy ends, with an itemized list of any deductions.
- A pet deposit may not exceed one month’s rent.
- An application fee may not exceed the greater of 10% of the monthly rent or $50.
- Under Section 5501(d), a late fee may not exceed 5% of the monthly rent and can be charged only after a five-day grace period.
Notice rules in Chapter 51 also shape operations. Under Section 5107, an owner who wants to renew a lease on different terms, including a rent increase, must give written notice at least 60 days before the lease ends, and Section 5106 sets a 60-day notice to end a term lease or month-to-month tenancy. Section 5118 requires landlords to give new tenants the Attorney General’s summary of the Landlord-Tenant Code. These rules do not show up as a separate expense line, but they affect how quickly rents can be adjusted and how much staff time leasing takes.
Eviction representation and the new tenant guide
Delaware’s Right to Representation law in Chapter 56 gives tenants with household income at or below 200% of the federal poverty guidelines access to free counsel in eviction cases, phasing in through June 30, 2028, subject to funding. Landlords must provide the program’s informational materials at lease signing, at the first renewal after November 22, 2023, and with any notice for late rent, a lease violation or termination. Landlords with three or fewer units and no attorney or agent are excluded. SB 132, signed September 3, 2025, moved the program’s administration to the State Courts Administrator. For an apartment owner, the practical effects are added paperwork and, in contested cases, potentially longer and costlier eviction proceedings.
HB 311, signed June 10, 2026, adds another document. It directs the Delaware Real Estate Commission to create a statewide landlord-tenant guide that landlords must give to prospective tenants and at certain renewals of leases of a year or longer, with failure to do so treated as an unlawful practice. The requirement starts one year after enactment or upon notice in the Register of Regulations, whichever comes first, with penalties beginning 180 days after that.
Transfer taxes and other state charges
Some Delaware taxes hit at acquisition or for particular uses rather than every month:
- Realty transfer tax: 4% in total, with 2.5% going to the state and 1.5% to the county or municipality, split equally between buyer and seller unless the contract says otherwise. On a $3,000,000 purchase, that is $120,000, or $60,000 each at the default split.
- Commercial lessor tax: the state’s commercial lessor license and gross receipts tax are aimed at commercial leasing, and the Division of Revenue’s definition of a commercial unit excludes dwelling units. Owners of mixed-use buildings with storefronts should confirm whether that portion is covered.
- Short-term rentals: a 4.5% state lodging tax applies to stays of 31 nights or fewer under agreements made on or after January 1, 2025.
Flood maps and insurance in Dover
Insurance is driven mostly by building age, construction, claims history and coverage choices, but flood exposure is a local factor. Dover participates in the National Flood Insurance Program, and its flood insurance rate maps carry dates of May 5, 2003 and July 7, 2014; the city’s floodplain management information identifies the Little River system as a mapped flood source. A building in a mapped special flood hazard area with a federally backed mortgage will generally need flood coverage, which can be a significant addition to the premium. Owners and buyers should pull the flood zone determination for each parcel early rather than assuming a building is outside the mapped area.
Budgeting takeaways for Dover owners
Putting the pieces together, a realistic budget for a Dover apartment building should:
- Calculate city tax on the 2020 city assessment and county and school tax on the 2023-based county value, and plan for the city’s switch to county values in fiscal 2028.
- Model owner-paid electricity at current Rate R or the applicable commercial schedule, with an allowance for further increases given the utility’s rising power costs.
- Budget water and sewer from actual meter readings, remembering that sewer charges are more than double the water rate per gallon.
- Include the annual rental permit fee, plus a reserve for reinspections and the repairs that inspections uncover.
- Assume fee income is capped by the Landlord-Tenant Code and that compliance paperwork will grow with the new tenant guide.
Every one of these lines flows into net operating income, which drives what a building is worth. Our NOI calculator is a quick way to see how utility and tax assumptions change the bottom line, and the Delaware market overview compares Dover with other cities in the state. Owners weighing a sale can learn more on our page about selling an apartment building in Dover.
