Any tips or suggestions to protest property tax increase?

Answer 1

You can't protest the tax increase, you can only protest the valuation of the home. If the FMV listed on the assessment record isn't accurate you'll need proof of your claim for a lower valuation. The fastest way to handle that is to get a professional appraisal of the home. That will cost you a few $$$ but may be worth it.

If the professional's appraisal is lower than the value on the assessor's record, you have a sound basis for your protest and should succeed.

And if the professional's appraisal is higher than the value on the property assessor's record, just keep your mouth shut and be thankful that the assessor got it wrong.

Answer 2

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Answer 3

Have an actual appraisal done first & foremost. Contact your government center to find out who you need appeal to regarding the tax increase.
File your appeal with the correct dept along with a copy of your appraisal (not the original). You will have to appear before the appeal dept on a set date and you do have to wait a few weeks for a decision. We have won both our office & personal appeals due to the real appraisal we had done.
My office just went through this process as I did personally. We had an appraisal done to our house and 1 month late, the city did its drive-by appraisal (which is what they do)and the city appraisal was $30k higher than the actual appraisal.

Everyone should start appealing the property tax appraisals as they are always very high so you will pay more property tax.

Answer 4

1. Take the worst possible pictures of your property. If there are cracks or it's beat up and worn highlight that. If it's in mint condition move on to step 2.

2. Research comparable properties. This may be in your neighborhood or not. My county appraisal district has all this information online as do most metropolitan counties/parishes.

You'll often find that the "value" your property was given is hardly objective when comparing similar properties who are given very low values. Find inconsistencies.

I once was in the tax appraisal office doing some research and found that some people are treated well when protesting their taxes while others are just told "you can sue us if you want." There's a couple reasons for this but I won't go into it online.

Make sure you write off your property taxes if you're filing income taxes. All taxes you pay can be written off your taxable income. But until someone shows me the LAW that requires an individual US Citizen to pay income taxes I'll leave that nonsense up to you and the rest of America who are too scared, of the IRS, to stand up for themselves.

Answer 5

Go to the courthouse and check on the assessments of comparable houses. If there are many in your neighborhood that are pretty much the same, that's the ones to check.

Take pictures of any area of your house that is in need of repair or remodel. Take the pics with you to your hearing.

Good luck.

Answer 6

In Texas, if the valuables is the taxpayer's living house, the assessed fee will develop by skill of in straight forward terms 10% of the assessed fee for the previous twelve months regardless of the quantity by skill of which the valuables fee larger. until the housing bubble burst, the assessed fee of my domicile on no account caught as much as the marketplace fee.