Texas Property Tax Information
Texas is one of the states in which commercial and industrial property owners tend to have to pay more in property taxes than personal property owners. Generally, though, Texas property owners have one of the lowest tax burdens in the country. It has no corporate income tax or individual income tax, and no property tax is assessed at the state level.
However, the local government assesses property tax, and there are even some special taxing districts that levy taxes on both real and tangible personal property. Local governments can offer businesses an abatement on local ad valorem taxes, though, for up to 10 years if they choose to do so. With Bill 849 being passed, property tax appeals have become easier.
Property Assessment
In Texas, all property, including commercial and industrial property is assessed at 100 percent of its true market value. However, when it comes to assessing complex equipment like the kind used in manufacturing businesses and other production industries, the process can be much more difficult than it appears on the surface. Determining the market value of such equipment involves taking numerous factors into consideration, such as the depreciation of the equipment and the future revenue generation of it. Obviously, these factors are not clean-cut, black and white ones. They involve much figuring and prediction that is based upon even more factors, such as the state of the economy and supply and demand.
Current Legislative Issues
Currently, Dan Patrick is now the lieutenant governor of the state. He has always pushed for property tax relief, and he states that he will continue doing so. While many property owners, of course, favor this move, some local governments are worried about where they’ll make up the revenue that they’ll lose in the proposed appraisal caps are put on properties. Because property taxes in Texas are based on the rate of the tax and the value of the property that is assessed and property values tend to increase all the time, local governments can still collect higher taxes while boasting that they didn’t actually raise the tax rate. Appraisal caps would prevent this from occurring by limiting the amount that that the taxable value of property can be raised every year.
Assessment Technologies Experts
Regardless of what the legislature decides to do regarding appraisal caps, there are still measures that commercial and industrial property owners can take to help ensure that they don’t end up overpaying on their property taxes even if you have filed late. Experts like those at Assessment Technologies use a unique valuation method to assess commercial and industrial property. This method takes into consideration the unique and complex issues that affect such equipment and the industry in which it operates. Assessment Technologies ensures that it provides a more in-depth analysis of the property and equipment, and they ensure that they have the appropriate documentation to back up their claims that property owners’ commercial and industrial property was assessed too highly. In many cases, Assessment technologies can assist property owners with recovering refunds from taxes that they ended up paying too much on and reducing the assessed value of their property, saving them money not only in the present but in the future as well.
Texas Property Tax Resource: http://comptroller.texas.gov/taxinfo/proptax/
