Disputing Property Taxes ( Denton County)

I just recently went through this (as did many in my neighborhood). A local realtor walked us through what we needed to do. It was actually really easy.

You'll first need some comps -- you can usually get these from a realtor in your area -- of some similarly priced homes. Look for some low end ones because the higher end ones will not help you. You need to look at the price the house actually sold for and the actual price per square foot. Also, if the seller paid anything in the closing (basically the seller loans the buyer a down payment and this is factored into the final sales price) you need to back this out of the final sales price. Also factor out the 6% realtor fees.

Look at your proposed tax statement and figure out what they are assessing your price per square foot to be. Now look at the comps and see what homes are actually going for and note the difference. I argued (successfully as did many others in my neighborhood) that the sales price on the comps includes the 6% realtor commission plus the $$ the people spend to get the house ready to go to market (often this is listed as the various upgrades in the descriptive section of the comps) plus, in some cases, the seller paid amount.

The big key is that these houses (the comps) are market ready and your house is not. I argued that to bring our house to market ready status would cost 10s of thousands to do. Think about it... you'd have to paint the interior and exterior, need new carpet, new counters (in our case), landscaping, etc., etc. I then brought in large (printed on my computer) pictures of all the things we'd need to fix/upgrade. I had pictures of scratched bath tubs, crummy looking sink fixtures, carpet stains, exterior siding that needs replacing, our ancient/original to house AC unit, etc. I basically came prepared with a ton of pictures to show them. I also mentioned that we had had termites that year. The assessor ended up knocking us down about 10% which I thought was great.

Good luck!

You need at least 3 comps of houses sold in your area. You can get them from any realtor. It's a simple report they can do really fast, that has houses the same size in the same area as yours.

We actually have a hearing this Wed. for disputing our in Denton County. Corinth raised ours 10,000 from last year! Unbelievable, I have heard they are doing it to make up a shortfall from some corporations pulling out of the city and the lack of the mayor wanting new industry moving in.
Just fill out the forms, it is a very simple process. Our friends hearing was last week and they won. I will let you know how ours goes :)
M.
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Does your home need any repair work...new roof, new AC, new siding, termite damage, etc. If so to any of these, take pictures and have those with you. Also, go to the Denton County Appraisal District website and look up other homes in your neighborhood and find out what they are appraised for. You want to find homes that are about the same age and the same size as yours. When you find homes that are lower print the info, especially if the home might be nicer (more upgrades, etc). When you go to the hearing have the pictures and other appraisal info as your evidence to why they should lower the appraisal. If you have just moved into the house within the past year you also have a good case for them lowering the appraisal to what it was when you bought. If you have houses around you that are also recently built and unoccupied or recently occupied they'll probably have lower appraisals, use those numbers also. We've found in all our protest attempts, if you do a bit of homework and come prepared they'll lower it. Good luck!