We purchased a home in McKinney on 9/6/2022 for $X. Our tax valuation now is purchase price plus 7%. Is 7% appreciation so close to purchase seem a little aggressive as the market just showed what that property is worth.

In 2022 the valuation was almost 35% below the new valuation.

This is a fairly large house in McKinney 4,000+ sq ft, so these % are pretty significant amounts.

How do I go about protesting, do I need to prepare a presentation or just show that I paid X for it 6 months ago?

Not so humble brag

Pick out EVERYTHING that is wrong with it. Any leak staining, any tile issues, any foundation issues, any deck issues (if you have one), roof issues, anything that needs repair. Either have quotes or estimates for the repairs that you can present and have photos documenting those conditions. You want a laundry list of items and costs to show why their value is X and you want it reduced to Y because of the issues.

Trying to prove comparably priced homes they picked out for their appraisal will most likely not go in your favor so you need to show why there is a difference. Protest and have a preliminary meeting to discuss. Again, in most cases, they will meet around half way unless you can show a lot of repair costs.

I've never taken it above the preliminary meeting where they have come down on the appraisal so maybe others can chime in on that process.

ETA, in the past, if you paid below value, that helped with the reduction, but that happened to us a long time ago so I don't know if that flies anymore for a good reason. It makes perfect sense to me, but you know how that goes now.

Property tax valuations are as of January 1st. If houses are still moving in your area, how do those compare to what they're valuing yours at? Easy enough to protest, but doubtful you'll get it below what you paid.

On a $800k house (4000 sf * $200, probably low actually) 7% of additional value at 2.5% (not sure on McKinney rates) is $1400, so while not nothing, isn't the end of the world for someone in a $800k house with 3-4 HVAC units (so thinks the appraisal district).

mosdefn14 said:

---

Property tax valuations are as of January 1st. If houses are still moving in your area, how do those compare to what they're valuing yours at? Easy enough to protest, but doubtful you'll get it below what you paid.

On a $800k house (4000 sf * $200, probably low actually) 7% of additional value at 2.5% (not sure on McKinney rates) is $1400, so while not nothing, isn't the end of the world for someone in a $800k house with 3-4 HVAC units (so thinks the appraisal district).

---

would the comps that were done during the purchase still work? or is a few months old from January still too dated?

You have the most telling comp out there....the purchase of the actual house in question.

I'm all for paying fewer property taxes and wouldn't blame you if you tried to hire someone to do that. But pretty straightforward....you bought the house in late 2022, that's the value of the house. Them saying it's really 7% higher is dumb. If so, it would have sold for 7% more. Similar as if you were to argue that you overpaid by 7%. We're talking a delta of 3-4 months, not 10.....

so i pulled up my information and the appraisal was more than our purchase price but still below the valuation. Should I just bring the closing document and not worry about the appraisals we had done?

A lot will depend on what the board is receptive to (or not).

When I lived in Rockwall, I protested one time (2010) by simply showing my closing statement from the previous September. They set that as the new value and it was all done.
Last year, I protested after buying a house in central Texas in May '21 and having the appraisal come in at 20% over what I paid (I didn't expect a complete reset to closing since there were still 7 months after I bought it, but thought 20% was pretty crazy), but they didn't budge at all. Magically this year, they didn't bump it at all - I guess it ran like crazy until January 1 last year, then just stopped

TXAGGIES said:

---

so i pulled up my information and the appraisal was more than our purchase price but still below the valuation. Should I just bring the closing document and not worry about the appraisals we had done?

---

An appraisal is just an estimate - what you paid in actual cash was the actual value on that date. That doesn't mean they won't say it increased after closing, just saying that what you paid on a date should be more valued than what somebody said it was worth.

What you paid is the value. I would go with that. If they don't like it you can appeal and then put together the "presentation"

Thanks for everyone's help.

You need two arguments.

1. Use your closing statement. This is the ultimate evidence because it is so recent. You want the appraised value and the valuation lowered to this amount. If you only get the taxable amount lowered, you are signing up for yearly increases. The value is exactly what you paid period. I might also have data that shows the number of mortgage applications falling for the past x months to counter any arguments about it increasing since purchase.

2. Call you realtor and ask them to pull comparable sells or homes for you. As some point, you will have your comps and the tax district will have theirs (you can request theirs). You will explain why their comps are poor comps and why yours are better. This can be, "but that home has a x car garage, or it has an outdoor kitchen that is better than mine." blah, blah, blah...

Argument 1 is you main argument, but it is good to have argument two as backup/additional. Winning this year on appraisal and valuation is important because you will never have better data than now.

GrimesCoAg95 said:

---

You need two arguments.

1. Use your closing statement. This is the ultimate evidence because it is so recent. You want the appraised value and the valuation lowered to this amount. If you only get the taxable amount lowered, you are signing up for yearly increases. The value is exactly what you paid period. I might also have data that shows the number of mortgage applications falling for the past x months to counter any arguments about it increasing since purchase.

2. Call you realtor and ask them to pull comparable sells or homes for you. As some point, you will have your comps and the tax district will have theirs (you can request theirs). You will explain why their comps are poor comps and why yours are better. This can be, "but that home has a x car garage, or it has an outdoor kitchen that is better than mine." blah, blah, blah...

Argument 1 is you main argument, but it is good to have argument two as backup/additional. Winning this year on appraisal and valuation is important because you will never have better data than now.

---

i have already done #2 as well as I was looking to upgrade my home for some significant investment.
I have quotes for cost to repair/replace the windows $60-100K, 3 A/C systems all 15+ years old, and a few others that they wont care about but more paperwork for them to look through.

In north Texas, just plan on an increase of 10% per year. That's pretty much what I've seen in the 8 years since I bought my house for.