CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Just like her pink house and her curious canines, Colette Forrest’s Wesley Heights neighborhood has a lot of character. She’s watched it change since she moved in 23 years ago, buying her home for just $100,000.

“The neighborhood was actually categorized as a fragile neighborhood,” Forrest said.

She says her home was broken into several times when she first moved in, prompting her home insurance company to drop her coverage.

Today, it’s far from fragile, with a nearby church now converted into condos starting at $500,000 each. Forrest’s home value has more than tripled — hiking her tax bill and her neighbors’, too.

“They’re terrified and I don’t want to lose my home,” she said. “I don’t want to lose my real estate legacy.”

She was approved for the Helping Out Mecklenburg’s Homeowners with Economic Support, or HOMES, program, designed to help individuals making less than 80% of the area median income pay their property taxes. And this year the county increased the max allowed to individual homeowners.

Forrest’s value went from $295,000 in Mecklenburg County’s 2019 revaluation to $380,000 in this year’s.

“Whoah! How am I going to be able to afford this?” she asked herself when she opened her new tax bill. “You are evaluating my home based on these new property owners that have totally built their home anew from the ground up. That’s not fair.”

Last year, she received a $340 credit toward her tax bill, and this year she received the county’s new maximum $660. She calls the increase in funding a game changer.

The county extended the Nov. 17 deadline to apply for HOMES funding to Dec. 15.