Urban regeneration strengthens the competitiveness of the local economy, which depends on substantial investment of public/private money to make development happen. Over the last few decades funding of urban regeneration projects at the global level has been the subject of much debate with increasing concern about the high costs and methods of financing. Innovative funding models including Public Private Partnerships (PPP), and Private Finance Initiative (PFI) in the UK and Business Improvement Districts (BIDs) and Tax Increment Financing (TIF) in the US have been utilized to fund urban regeneration projects during this period. This paper assesses the application and outcomes of tax-based incentives in urban regeneration by drawing upon case study analysis in the UK and USA. TIF will examine as the main method of financing regeneration projects in the states of California as the first province to utilize and also the earliest in the United States to eliminate the model. The paper analyses the TIF’s successes and failures, drawing out the potential problems and benefits of the tool, the ability to lever private sector finance and its economic impact. The outcome of this paper comprises recommendations for more viable strategies and policies that TIF offers to finance urban regeneration and make a significance contribution to research which is currently on going.