On a Del Sur home's property tax bill, the special taxes can look like one flat charge that gets added to the cost of owning. The bill shows a dollar figure. A buyer multiplies it by thirty years, sets it against a 4S Ranch or Rancho Bernardo listing, and moves on.
That figure is actually made up of as many as three separate levies. Three different public agencies set them, under three different formulas, and each ends on its own schedule. Two of them have published end dates that fall within roughly the next decade. One is being billed this year at less than half of what its formula allows.
One Line Item, Three Districts
Most Del Sur homes sit inside overlapping Community Facilities Districts. Each one was formed to pay off bonds that built roads, schools and other public facilities while the master plan went up.
- City of San Diego CFD No. 4, "Black Mountain Ranch Villages." It is split into Zone 1 and Zone 2. The tax is assigned by floor area, using the home's square footage and building-permit data.
- Poway Unified School District CFD No. 14. Its FY2025/26 report describes it as lying within Del Sur and Black Mountain Ranch. That year it levied $5,004,292.92 across 1,144 units.
- PUSD CFD No. 14, Improvement Area A. This is a separate levy that also covers Del Sur, with $4,585,819.40 levied across 1,146 units in FY2025/26. Its original bonds paid for public improvements belonging to other agencies. It was formed under joint agreements with the City of San Diego and Caltrans.
These layers can stack. At least one Del Sur parcel appears with a nonzero tax on both the CFD 14 roll and the Improvement Area A roll for FY2025/26. Each layer runs on its own clock, so the combined bill drops in steps, starting with whichever layer ends first.
The City Is Billing Less Than Half Its Ceiling
The City's CFD No. 4 formula dates to May 2002. It sets an "assigned special tax" for each size class of home, and that assigned rate is the maximum. The district does not have to bill the maximum. Each year it collects only what that year's bond payments and obligations require.
According to the City's FY2026-27 administration report for CFD No. 4, billing every developed parcel at its full assigned rate would raise $2,324,152, which is far more than needed. The FY2026-27 tax on each developed parcel was therefore cut to about 48.90% of the assigned rate, for a total of $1,136,581.
Here is what that looks like for a few common home sizes:
| CFD No. 4 class | Home size | Assigned maximum | FY2026-27 actual |
|---|---|---|---|
| Zone 1, Class 6 | 2,501 to 2,750 sq. ft. | $2,500.02 | $1,222.58 |
| Zone 1, Class 11 | 3,751 to 4,250 sq. ft. | $3,683.42 | $1,801.30 |
| Zone 2, Class 7 | 2,751 to 3,000 sq. ft. | $3,442.95 | $1,683.70 |
| Zone 2, Class 11 | 3,751 to 4,250 sq. ft. | $4,776.75 | $2,335.98 |
| Zone 2, Class 17 | 7,251 to 9,250 sq. ft. | $12,858.26 | $6,288.10 |
The assigned-rate tables also list no annual escalator for developed homes. The levy also has a scheduled end. The City's CFD FAQ lists the final bond maturity for CFD No. 4 as September 1, 2037, with the last levy expected in fiscal year 2036-2037. The formula technically permits up to 50 years of levies starting in FY2002-03. It also says the levy stops earlier once the bonds are paid, the facilities have been acquired and all reimbursements to the developer have been paid.
So the smallest layer is billing under half its maximum and has roughly ten more tax years before its expected end.
The School District Moved Its Finish Line in 2025
The school layer is the larger one, and it changed most recently. In FY2025/26, average assigned rates for detached homes in CFD 14 ran from $3,140.77 for homes under 1,800 square feet to $6,217.46 for homes over 3,450 square feet. A detached home of 2,801 to 3,000 square feet averaged $4,667.26. Attached homes averaged $2,983.56 to $3,698.93, depending on size. PUSD notes that these are class averages and an individual parcel's rate may differ.
These rates also grow. Under the PUSD formulas for CFD 14 and Improvement Area A, assigned rates on established developed parcels rise 2% a year.
Then the end date moved. In a Poway Unified release tied to its September 11, 2025 board meeting, the district said refinancing bonds first issued in 2015 would save Del Sur's CFD 14 households $17.4 million. The district expects payments to end "as early as 2032, nearly 20 years sooner than planned." It credited high demand for bonds rated AA+ and AA by S&P Global Ratings for the lower interest rates. Associate Superintendent Eric Dill put it this way in the same release:
"By refinancing at a lower cost, we're not only saving families money, but also shortening the amount of time they'll be making these special tax payments."
"As early as" matters here. 2032 is the district's projection, not a date printed on any parcel's bill. Even so, the largest recurring special tax on many Del Sur homes now has a projected end about six years out from this fall.
The Layer Without a Published Finish Line
Improvement Area A is the open question. Its FY2025/26 report shows that its 2015 bonds are tied to the same refinancing. On September 11, 2025, the 2015A revenue bonds they helped repay were refunded by new Series 2025A bonds. The 2015 local obligation bonds themselves remain outstanding. The PUSD release names CFD 14 but does not mention Improvement Area A separately.
The Improvement Area A formula allows taxes for up to 35 fiscal years after the last bond series, with a hard stop after FY2050-2051. In FY2025/26, class rates ran from $2,974.88 to $5,403.20 for detached homes and from $2,665.00 to $3,436.88 for attached homes. If a home carries this layer, it is the line to ask about directly, because nothing published so far ties it to the 2032 projection.
What Those Clocks Do to a 92127 Comparison
Del Sur shares the 92127 ZIP code with 4S Ranch. In September 2026, the ZIP's detached median sale price was $1,900,000, down 2.6% from a year earlier. That came in a month when the San Diego County detached median rose 5.8% to $1,079,000. Detached homes in 92127 had 2.3 months of supply and averaged 30 days on market. Attached homes had a median of $859,500 and 4.1 months of supply, which gives buyers more time to compare.
Within that ZIP, the special-tax clocks don't line up. Next door in 4S Ranch, PUSD's CFD 6 averaged $3,503.06 per detached unit in FY2025/26. The district projects that its payments will end as early as 2030. Lined up together, the published dates look like this:
- As early as 2030: PUSD CFD 6, 4S Ranch
- As early as 2032: PUSD CFD 14, Del Sur
- FY2036-2037: City CFD No. 4, Black Mountain Ranch Villages, expected final levy
- No later than FY2050-2051: PUSD CFD 14 Improvement Area A, formula's hard stop
Take a detached home of about 2,900 square feet in CFD 14 and City Zone 2. Before any Improvement Area A amount, it would carry about $6,350 a year: the FY2025/26 class average of $4,667.26 for CFD 14 plus the FY2026-27 City rate of $1,683.70. If PUSD's projection holds, roughly three-quarters of that ends around 2032. The rest is expected to end with the City's final levy in the mid-2030s. That means two homes in the same ZIP can have similar tax lines today and very different costs over the next ten years, depending on which districts they sit in and when each one ends.
Checking a Specific Address
The averages above describe classes, not houses. Zone 1 and Zone 2 follow the City's boundary map, not neighborhood names. PUSD amounts are tied to the parcel. To find what applies to one home:
- Get the home's Assessor's Parcel Number from the listing packet or the county tax bill.
- Use the parcel search on PUSD's special district transparency site. Parcel data there is updated each year around August 30.
- Check the City's CFD special tax rates page, which links the CFD No. 4 rate schedule, formula and boundary map.
FAQ
Can an owner pay off the City's CFD No. 4 tax early? The City's CFD FAQ says property owners may prepay their special tax lien under each district's formula. It directs owners to its CFD administrator, NBS Government Finance Group.
Are the Del Sur HOA dues and the Community Services Council part of this? No. The Del Sur Community Association is funded by monthly dues and handles common-area maintenance, covenant enforcement and design review. The Del Sur Community Services Council is a nonprofit that supports community activities and clubs. It is funded by an enhancement fee charged when a home sells, not by a recurring line on the tax bill.
Can the City's rate go back up toward its maximum? The formula sets the assigned rate as the ceiling and bills only what each year's obligations require. That requirement is recalculated every year.
This post is general information about published district documents, not legal, tax or financial advice. Please confirm the details for any specific property with a qualified tax professional or the district administrator.
If you own in Del Sur and want to know how your home's special-tax end dates fit into its value and its appeal to the next buyer, Karlee Van Dyke can pull your parcel's district records and include them in your pricing plan. Get Your Free Home Valuation.
