Deerfield housing choices can involve a balance between a building's immediate usefulness and the possibilities attached to its land. Keep those parts of the decision separate. The public record can describe assessed housing and parcel size, but it cannot establish the feasibility of a new use or the time needed to maintain the property. Those questions require address-specific evidence.
How should you evaluate a property with extra land?
Identify which parts of the parcel serve the home, which support the proposed use and which carry constraints. Recorded acreage does not establish a buildable area or a surveyed boundary. Ask for plans, easements and relevant prior decisions. If the property is attractive because of a possible project, seek an answer about that proposal before relying on it. A purchase that works in its current form carries a different decision risk from one that depends on uncertain future approvals.
What does the commute average leave out?
It combines trips by many residents to many workplaces during the survey period. It cannot predict a journey from a Deerfield address to your chosen destination. Test the actual route at the relevant time and include parking or the last connection. Repeat the exercise for frequent errands and other household schedules. Sunderland and Greenfield provide nearby municipal comparisons, but a similar average commute across towns does not mean the candidate properties support the same daily routine.
How do you compare ownership budgets?
Start with the property's current tax bill, insurance quote and known service arrangements. Use the assessment-based illustration below only as a common reference while you identify actual candidates. Larger grounds, outbuildings or private systems can introduce costs outside a standard mortgage estimate. Ask for maintenance history and price necessary work individually. That prevents the town median or the advertised acreage from obscuring the expense of the particular property the household would need to operate.
Massachusetts Department of Revenue: determining property values.
What does the local record show?
These towns provide local context for the decision in this article. The figures describe the published records and survey periods identified below. Compare the same measures across places, then confirm the details of any actual home before using them in a budget or offer.
Local Figures for This Decision
Download CSV, same columns, same definitions
Selected municipalities, shown alphabetically. Definitions below distinguish assessments, administrative benchmarks and survey estimates from current market quotes.
| Town | Single-family Assessment | Annual Tax Illustration | Median Lot Acres | Mean Commute Minutes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Deerfield | $424,900 | $5,846 | 0.81 | 17.4 |
| Greenfield | $264,600 | $4,963 | 0.32 | 17.8 |
| Sunderland | $396,450 | $5,042 | 0.89 | 18.9 |
What These Columns Mean
- Town
- Municipality; follow its record below for the full data and address check.
- Single-family Assessment
- Median assessed value of single-family parcels. This is a tax-roll statistic, not an asking price, appraisal or median sale price. Assessment years are identified in the sources.
- Annual Tax Illustration
- The published residential rate applied to the town's median single-family assessment, including the recorded community preservation surcharge and its general first-value exemption where adopted. Individual exemptions, special assessments and a future reassessment can change an actual bill.
- Median Lot Acres
- Median recorded single-family parcel acreage. Lot area is not a measure of buildable, dry or accessible land and does not establish a surveyed boundary.
- Mean Commute Minutes
- Survey mean travel time to work for workers who travel to work. This is not a drive-time prediction to a chosen employer, a rush-hour estimate or a promise about a particular route.
Cite: RE413. “Local Figures for This Decision.” Updated September 19, 2026. https://www.re413.com/news/living-in-deerfield-ma/, underlying sources at https://www.re413.com/sources/.
Deerfield's town record. Single-family assessment: $424,900. Annual tax illustration: $5,846. Median lot acres: 0.81. Mean commute minutes: 17.4.
Greenfield's town record. Single-family assessment: $264,600. Annual tax illustration: $4,963. Median lot acres: 0.32. Mean commute minutes: 17.8.
Sunderland's town record. Single-family assessment: $396,450. Annual tax illustration: $5,042. Median lot acres: 0.89. Mean commute minutes: 18.9.
How has the published average tax bill changed?
This is the Department of Revenue's published average single-family tax-bill series in nominal dollars. It is a different measure from the current median-assessment illustration above. Changes can reflect the tax levy, assessed values and the housing stock; this is not a forecast of the bill for a home you buy.
Published Average Single-Family Tax Bill
$6,283Fiscal 2026; Deerfield
What should you check next?
- Separate the land's existing useful area from future plans and verify the records supporting each intended use.
- Test work and errand routes from the specific address, including the household's regular arrival times.
- Build ownership budgets from current bills and documented maintenance needs for each Deerfield, Sunderland or Greenfield candidate.
Keep the address, document date and source alongside each answer. If records disagree, identify which period and property each describes before treating the difference as a change. A missing result leaves a question open; it does not establish that a property has no problem or no cost.
Where can you continue the comparison?
Browse all housing guides by subject.
Open the linked town records for the wider context, including sources and dates. Use the property-specific records to narrow a decision, and keep current quotes separate from the historical figures used to explain it here.
Which official guidance supports this article?
- Massachusetts Department of Revenue: determining property values. Guidance checked 2026-09-05; confirm current requirements for your transaction.
Sources
- MassGIS and municipal assessors. single-family assessment, annual tax illustration, median lot acres. Figures through Deerfield: FY2026; Greenfield: FY2025; Sunderland: FY2026. Checked 2026-08-21.
- Massachusetts Department of Revenue, Division of Local Services. annual tax illustration. Figures through Deerfield: FY2026; Greenfield: FY2026; Sunderland: FY2026. Checked 2026-08-05.
- Massachusetts Department of Revenue, community preservation records. annual tax illustration. Checked 2026-08-05.
- U.S. Census Bureau, commuting survey. mean commute minutes. Figures through 2023. Checked 2026-08-05.
- Massachusetts Department of Revenue, historical average single-family tax bills. Published annual mean bills in the chart; nominal dollars, with only common reporting years in a two-town comparison. Figures through FY2010–FY2026. Checked 2026-08-05.
"Figures through" is the period the publisher's data describes; "checked" is only when we last asked. The full sourcing: sources and method.