Discover the Kent CT Neighborhood: Homes & Community

Kent at a glance

The Town of Kent describes itself as a rural community of about 3,000 residents in the northwest corner of Litchfield County, incorporated in 1739, with a history as a farming town and an iron ore producer, and made up of small hamlets such as Bulls Bridge, Kent Hollow, South Kent and The Cobble. Downtown sits at the crossing of Route 7 and Route 341, marked by the Civil War Soldiers Monument, and the town says most of the shops, galleries and restaurants there are owner operated. Town government is a three member Board of Selectmen with a full time First Selectman; the legislative body is the Town Meeting, held the third Thursday in January, with the budget meeting the third Friday in May.

Schools in Kent

Kent Center School at 9 Judd Avenue is the public K to 8 school, recently renovated according to the town, and part of Region One, which the district describes as the first regional school district in Connecticut, serving Falls Village, Cornwall, Kent, North Canaan, Salisbury and Sharon. Each town keeps its own K to 8 school and board of education; graduates go on to Housatonic Valley Regional High School in Falls Village, opened in 1939, with roughly 350 to 400 students. The town also lists three private preparatory schools: Kent School, founded in 1906 and now serving about 520 boarding and day students in grades 9 to 12; South Kent School on Bulls Bridge Road; and Marvelwood School.

The river, the trail and the parks

• The Housatonic River and Bulls Bridge. FirstLight's Bulls Bridge Generating Station, completed in 1903, was the first large hydroelectric station in Connecticut, a run of river station in the towns of Kent and New Milford. Its Bulls Bridge Recreation Area at 248 Bulls Bridge Road has the covered bridge, an observation deck over the falls and rapids, trails that connect directly into the Appalachian Trail, and a second area by the powerhouse for canoe portage, picnicking and shoreline fishing.
• The Appalachian Trail. The Appalachian Trail Conservancy puts the trail's Connecticut stretch at 52.2 miles with seven shelters, maintained by the Appalachian Mountain Club's Connecticut chapter, and lists a Ten Mile River and Hill day hike of 5 miles starting at Bulls Bridge.
• Kent Falls State Park, 462 Kent Cornwall Road, where Falls Brook drops about 250 feet in a series of cascades on its way to the Housatonic, with a 0.84 mile out and back steps trail and an accessible path to the base. Open daily 8 a.m. to sunset; no swimming or entry into the water, and an alcohol ban, per the state parks system.
• Macedonia Brook State Park, 159 Macedonia Brook Road, 2,300 acres with more than 10 miles of trails, including the Blue Trail over Cobble Mountain, and a 51 site rustic campground whose 2026 season opened May 22; no pets in the campground, little or no cell service.
• Lake Waramaug State Park on the Kent and New Preston side of the lake, covered above.
• Emery Park, the town park at 42 Segar Mountain Road, with a blue trail to the summit of Leonard Mountain and a view of downtown; the town says the pool, trails and playground are under improvement.

Taxes, revaluation and land use in Kent

The Assessor's office posts a current mill rate of 16.87, a last revaluation dated October 1, 2023, and the next scheduled for October 1, 2028. The state's Office of Policy and Management dataset agrees, listing Kent at 16.87 for the fiscal year ending 2026 and 15.59 for the year before, on the October 1, 2024 and October 1, 2023 grand lists. Connecticut assesses at 70 percent of market value as of the revaluation date, so a 2026 purchase price does not become the assessment. The Land Use office serves the Planning and Zoning Commission, the Inland Wetlands Commission, the Zoning Board of Appeals and an Architectural Review Board, and the town's 2022 to 2032 Plan of Conservation and Development, with its land use, zoning, open space and PA-490 maps, is posted on the town site. Kent also adopted a municipal affordable housing plan in 2022 under the state's 8-30j requirement. Building permits run through the Building Department's online portal.

The state park at 30 Lake Waramaug Road is, in the state's words, the only public access point on the 656 acre lake, with a car top launch, a 76 site campground and no state ramp for power boats; the page is quoted in Lake Waramaug State Park as the state describes it.

Sources for this section: Town of Kent, About Kent, Town Government, Mill Rate and Revaluation, Plan of Conservation and Development, Emery Park and Housing Plan Steering Committee pages. Region One Schools, History and Structure page. Kent Center School and Kent School websites. FirstLight, Bulls Bridge Generating Station and Bulls Bridge Recreation Area pages. Appalachian Trail Conservancy, Connecticut page. Connecticut State Parks, Kent Falls and Macedonia Brook pages. Figures are each body's own as published in September 2026 and change by year.

The 2026 conforming loan limit in Kent

832,750 dollars for a one unit property. Kent is in the Northwest Hills Planning Region, and in Connecticut the Federal Housing Finance Agency sets the conforming loan limits by planning region rather than by county. The Candlewood Lake towns just south, New Milford among them, are in the Western Connecticut Planning Region at 977,500 dollars. That is a 144,750 dollar difference in how large a loan can be before it stops being conforming, and it is worth settling before you narrow a search across both. The two regions, side by side.

Buying or selling in Connecticut: the parts that are the same everywhere

Kent shares Lake Waramaug with Washington and Warren, and Lake Waramaug State Park, which the state describes as the only public access on the lake, sits on the Kent and New Preston side. The lake has its own rulebook: no state boat launch, inspection of every motorboat at the Washington Town Ramp, and since April 2026 hot water decontamination for trailered boats. Lake Waramaug for a second home lays it out from the bodies that publish it.

Kent sits in Litchfield County rather than on Candlewood, but Connecticut transaction law does not change by town. These are the statewide rules that catch people out, whichever side of the county line the house is on.

• Septic. Connecticut does not license or certify septic inspectors, so who you hire is the whole safeguard. Connecticut does not certify the person inspecting your septic.
• Well water. Nobody is required to test the well before a sale. Nobody has to test the well before you buy.
• The closing. A Connecticut admitted attorney must conduct it, and the penalty for getting that wrong is criminal rather than administrative. A non attorney cannot legally close your purchase.
• Seller costs. Only one of them is a percentage set by statute. Only one selling cost is set by law, and what the conveyance tax actually costs works the numbers.
• The disclosure report. The $500 credit is not an exit. The $500 disclosure credit does not let a seller off the hook.
• Your assessment after you buy. The price you pay does not become your assessed value, and assessments run at seventy per cent of true and actual value. Your purchase price does not become your assessment.
• An inherited house. A fiduciary sale runs on a different sequence, and a fiduciary transfer is exempt from the condition report altogether. Selling an inherited house is not an ordinary sale.