The Bellevue School District is taking advantage of historically low interest rates saving taxpayers $8 million annually.

On Wednesday Bellevue School District board members unanimously approved the sale of $74.57 million worth of bonds to investment firm TD Securities.

Selling the bond with a true interest rate of 2.46 percent, netted the school district a premium of $11.1 million from TD Securities.

The funds, along with $1.6 million contributed by the district from collected property taxes were put into an escrow account to pay off the bonds when they becoming “callable” in 2018, according to Melissa DeVito, deputy superintendent of finance and operating.

“We have a lower par value on the bonds we’re now holding and we have a lower interest rate on those bonds,” she said. “That translates into reduced property taxes for homeowners.”

DeVito said the savings won’t be much for each individual homeowner, a few dollars, but the bond sale saves the city more than $8 million each year.

The reduction equates to roughly 1.2 cents per $1,000 of home value. For a home valued at $500,000, the property tax savings is about $6 a year.