Brinkman’s Tips to Protest Your Property Taxes
Jul. 21. 2020
It’s that time of year again. Time to protest your property taxes!
If you live in Travis County, only 150,000 homes were sent their updated tax appraisal. If you didn’t receive an updated appraisal, your home will stay what it was in 2019.
Are you looking at the appraised value of your home? Does it look too high? If so, you’ll want to get started protesting your property taxes. To help you with this process, I’ve compiled some notes. Here is goes:
You can protest your property taxes in one of three ways:
- Do It Yourself – Visit your county’s appraisal district. Then find homes on Realty Austin similar to yours to help prove your value should be lower. County appraisal websites: Travis, Williamson, Hays. While you’re doing this, it is important to note any deficiencies with your home: property age, older home systems, aging roof, foundation issues, etc.
- Appraisal From A Recent Refinance – Did you recently refinance or purchase a property? If your tax value is higher than the appraised value, you may use that appraisal or the contract to lower the tax value of your property.
- Local Company – Register online with a tax consultant to do the job for you! If they don’t save you any money, you don’t pay them. If they do, you pay them a percentage of what they saved you. My personal favorite tax consultant company is Five Stone, but Protax is also popular.
Which route you go depends on personal preference and how much time you have! My personal favorite is #3 – it’s worked for me time and time again.
Here’s a video recap of basically what I told you above:
You can also find more home buying, selling, and real estate tips on my YouTube Channel.
Hit me up if you have any additional questions!