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RE: "Mine?" A Deeper Look at the Realities of Home Ownership, Taxes and Government...
My husband and I have had that conversation every year when our "real estate taxes" come due. Like you pointed out, you pay the mortgage, the insurance, the upkeep and repairs, and then have to fork over additional money for the privilege of "owning" it. You pour a new concrete for your driveway and the tax assessor comes along and upgrades your assessed value at their discretion. You can appeal the valuation, but good luck with that.
So we pay for:
[source](my photo of my own real estate taxes bill)
And the valuation system varies from neighborhood to neighborhood. The same house we own would have twice at least the taxation if it were located by the lake.
It's somewhat of a mixed bag around here. Our property taxes here tend to be quite high (in terms of cost per $1000 of assessed value) but often the biggest issue we face is official valuations that are "manipulated up" because of budget shortfalls, so they can collect more. We'd be hard pressed to sell our house for its current assessed value.
Washington state also doesn't have a "homestead exemption" like I had when we lived in Texas... which adds to the cost.