Need to help a widow on her agricultural property tax exemption!

Yes, I understand the exact definition is not an exemption, but i've read or heard somewhere that a wildlife lease will sometimes qualify for an Agricultural property tax decrease

Anyone have an answer?

Thanks in advance!!

An Ag valuation can be converted to a Wildlife valuation. Is that what you are asking?

I'm working on my Wildlife Exemption right now on my 16 acres in Burleson County. I can tell you what is required here, but cannot comment on other counties.

Here, the exemption is determined by the county appraisal district. They require that you submit an application and a plan for their review and hopefully, their acceptance. The plan is a formal presentation of your management program, a plat of your property indicating the location of feeders, bird houses, food plots, water sources and any other items needed for wildlife management. Their are companies that can do this service or you can try it yourself. Mine is being prepared by a very helpful volunteer at the USDA in Caldwell.

At the end of each tax year, you must submit a report back to the appraisal district detailing what has been done the previous year. This would include all feed and improvement receipts as well as a report on the progress of your plan.

Pretty sensible and realistic process here in this county and all the people involved have been very helpful.

Good luck with your program.

I'm in Waller county and do the same thing. Here is a document that outlines some...ok...ALL of the details.

If you have current Ag, you can convert, and I would recommend it. As stated above, its a lot of paperwork, but I feel like its worth it.

https://www.comptroller.texas.gov/taxes/property-tax/docs/96-354.pdf

Traditional Ag and wildlife are revenue neutral. Whatever the Ag type the property is in when you convert it will always stay in that category.

The easier way is to maintain Ag and cut hay.

Thanks to all! Very helpful as usual! All I know comes from the outdoor posting! Hehe!

My dad and I just converted our property to a wildlife valuation. Among the things we implemented was predator control, native songbird feeding, bat boxes, brush management, supplemental water additions, etc.

You can find good examples of approved plans along with the differences in regions here:

http://tpwd.texas.gov/landwater/land/private/agricultural_land/

There are consultants more than happy to help. Some of them are freshly retired from the USDA and made a living out of writing such plans. Just saying.....

And don't be tricked by these retirees, writing these plans take about an hour to write (not counting a site visit, that adds on)....so watch their billing rate.

Kidding, we all do these a bit different.

I use to do some some run a business that failed do small acerage consulting. On the things I would do is writing plan. I would charge 500 to write a plan and $350 for the yearly report.

Folks would sit next to me as I filled in the online form from the TPWD website. There only response was my prices were cheap.

Holy crap I have to get out of the state mindset. If someone insists on paying me, I usually go gas plus $100...or a doe. Heck, off TA OB and local it's probably pay for my dinner (granted then, I just make the recommendations and sign the form if they are in a picky county, they actually write the plan).

Interesting. I've given some minor thought to doing this more seriously on the side.

Is leasing the pasture land to a local farmer out of the equation and just keep the Ag exemption?

We have helped maintain neighbors exemptions by running cattle and cutting hay.

ursusguy said:

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Holy crap I have to get out of the state mindset. If someone insists on paying me, I usually go gas plus $100...or a doe. Heck, off TA OB and local it's probably pay for my dinner (granted then, I just make the recommendations and sign the form if they are in a picky county, they actually write the plan).

Interesting. I've given some minor thought to doing this more seriously on the side.

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I was just out of college and was tired of working sales for a gun shop and then flooring company. I thought I wanted to run my own business. I was helping people write plans and would then fulfill them.

Problem is it was all rich people who had no idea what it actually took to manage rural land/wildlife or were just kooky. Kooky like writing plans to make their properties more habitable for feral hogs.

I was then offered a job were I got paid every 2 weeks and I jumped on it.

TRIPLE 7 said:

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Need to help a widow on her agricultural property tax exemption!

Yes, I understand the exact definition is not an exemption, but i've read or heard somewhere that a wildlife lease will sometimes qualify for an Agricultural property tax decrease

Anyone have an answer?

Thanks in advance!!

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Let's start by getting a couple of facts:

What county?
How many acres?


Fwiw, I do not know about all types of Ag Valuations, but I do know about using Beekeeping to get the Ag Valuation (was the first person in Brazos County to apply for it). If you want to talk, I'm not on TxAgs very often, so email me at chris@cornerstonehoneybees.com

the Ag and wildlife exemption are revenue neutral and nothing can stop you from getting wildlife if you already have ag unless the property was divided to less than 17 acres the previous year.