TYLER, Texas (KLTV) – Property tax value notices have begun to pour into East Texas mailboxes, leaving some homeowners with questions about what to do next when the number may not look quite right.
“The thing that actually establishes what your home is really worth in real life is what a buyer is willing to pay for it,” real estate broker and senior property tax consultant Chandler Crouch said. “Right now, if no buyer is trying to buy your home, then the appraisal district’s opinion of the value of your home is no better or no worse than your opinion.”
Homeowners have the right to challenge the assessment, as your county uses that value to calculate how much property tax you’ll pay later.
“They bring their evidence to the table. You get to bring your evidence to the table. And if you do a good job presenting evidence that they see as valid, then you can get a reduction on your property tax value, which will allow you or cause you to pay less property tax this year,” Crouch said.
Crouch said appraisal districts simply don’t go from home to home, resulting in estimates that may not be accurate.
“About half of the properties are valued too low. About half are valued too high. And you won’t know if your house is valued too high unless you go protest and you actually do the research,” Crouch said. “No appraiser has looked at the inside of your home, and they probably haven’t looked at your home specifically.”
Filing the protest
The first and easiest step, Crouch said, is filing the protest and submitting it to the Appraisal District by May 15, or 30 days after the district mails out the value notice.
“Filing your protest is as simple as taking your value notice, turning it over and filling out the back side of your value protest,” Crouch said.
If you don’t have the notice, Crouch says a bank sheet of paper will also do.
“You can take a sheet of paper and just say ‘I am protesting my property tax value’ and you give them the address, you sign the document,’ Crouch said. “You have to put two things on there. You say, ‘I’m protesting the market value and I’m protesting that it’s unequal when compared to other properties.’ That’s as technical as it needs to get.”
Gathering evidence
The next step is gathering the evidence to prove the value is lower.
For this, Crouch said homeowners can take a defensive or an offensive approach.
“The defensive strategy is you need to ask the appraisal district for the evidence that they plan to use against you if it were to go to a protest hearing,” Crouch said. “And then you look at the evidence they’re going to use and if they’re not proving their case, then you’re going to automatically win.”
An offensive strategy involves documenting home conditions in photos and getting repair estimates.
“The more substantial the issue, the better the evidence. So, you want to stick with plumbing, foundation, roof, electrical, that kind of thing. Things that don’t carry as much weight are issues like landscaping or dirty paint, dirty carpet, those kinds of cosmetic issues,” Crouch said.
Then, Crouch said to reach out to a realtor and look at the prices that nearby houses have sold at since January of last year.
“And most realtors are more than happy to provide sales data like that for you for free,” Crouch said.
All of that evidence is then sent to the appraisal district.
“Most of the time, you’re going to be able to upload information online and handle it in an informal way before you have to go to a hearing. And they’ll oftentimes offer you a reduction, and you just weigh the cost,” Crouch said.
Factors at play
The average Smith County home value is about $269,000. This is down 1.2% over the past year.
A recent change in state law may also help, but it’s separate from your home value.
“The property taxes that you’re going to end up paying are going to be probably less than they have been in recent years due to recent legislation that improves the homestead exemption for your property,” says Crouch.
A simple way to think about it is with this equation:
(Home Value) x (Tax Rate) – (Exemptions) = Your Tax Bill.
“But right now we’re dealing with the first part of the equation, Crouch said. “The rest of the whole property tax system, and how they calculate your actual bill, that takes place later on in the year. You don’t have near as much control over what happens after this little window.”
‘Everybody should file’
He said all homeowners, regardless of whether or not they agree with the value, should file a protest.
“Everybody should file a protest,” Crouch said. “It’s within your right to file a protest. It’s not going to hurt you by filing a protest. You’re not going to sell your house for less money…The government fully accepts and appreciates these protests. It helps them make the values accurate, so there’s no reason they shouldn’t be okay with it.”
He said even if homeowners agree with a value, they could be missing out on a discount.
“If somebody else is getting a discount on their property tax value, even if the value is accurate, you should get that same exact discount,” Crouch said. “And so that’s another reason for filing a protest is just to make sure there’s not any money that you’re leaving on the table, and in many cases, there almost certainly is.”
He said after this 30-day window, homeowners have much less say in what they pay.
“The rest of the whole property tax system, and how they calculate your actual bill, that takes place later on in the year,” Crouch said. “You don’t have near as much control over what happens after this little window.”
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