Your Property Taxes Could Be Way Too High

Have you ever wondered how your property tax assessment is calculated? If you do not know the answer, you can't be sure you are being taxed fairly.

Property Taxes in Texas are calculated off of an appraised value of your home. Appraisals are intended to represent the “current market value” of the property.

But what does that really mean? Anyone who has ever tried to sell a home knows “market value” is often in the eye of the beholder.

Since Texas has no state property tax, all property taxes and assessments are handled locally by counties, towns, and school districts. Local appraisal districts, for example Travis County Appraisal District (TCAD), issue appraisals based on the methodology of their choice.

There are no laws governing the methodologies used so they are not consistent across different districts. In most cases, constituents of a district do not choose the Chief Appraiser. In some cases, the district simply splits the total budget that they need to raise for the year across all the homes in the district without conducting individual calculations for each property.