dang, it!

do you recommend anyone I can use before the deadline this year, then hit you up next year?

Hit up Bettencourt Tax Advisors.

What's the latest the District releases valuations? Still waiting on ours...

Still haven't gotten my valuation in Montgomery county. Anyone else having issues? - looks like dexipus is as well.

Feel like this has been discussed before but have we come up with a consensus on whether the single or multimember ARB is better in Harris Co?

Think I have only ever done multi. I have a decent shot at a reduction if HCAD actually looks at logic (yes, I know) but I am fully expecting to end up at ARB. I've had reasonable success with ARB in the past but any advantage I can get is a bonus.

Got my protests in just under the wire.

A different approach that was suggested to me is to argue my improvements have effectively no value because every property that is selling on my block is being torn down for new construction. In essence, the very nature of my property lowers its value, given the replacement factor.

chjoak said:

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Feel like this has been discussed before but have we come up with a consensus on whether the single or multimember ARB is better in Harris Co?

Think I have only ever done multi. I have a decent shot at a reduction if HCAD actually looks at logic (yes, I know) but I am fully expecting to end up at ARB. I've had reasonable success with ARB in the past but any advantage I can get is a bonus.

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I think it's probably a crap shoot. Every time I've been in front of the 3-person ARB, there was one person who pushed the other two into agreeing with them.

Ryan the Temp said:

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chjoak said:

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Feel like this has been discussed before but have we come up with a consensus on whether the single or multimember ARB is better in Harris Co?

Think I have only ever done multi. I have a decent shot at a reduction if HCAD actually looks at logic (yes, I know) but I am fully expecting to end up at ARB. I've had reasonable success with ARB in the past but any advantage I can get is a bonus.

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I think it's probably a crap shoot. Every time I've been in front of the 3-person ARB, there was one person who pushed the other two into agreeing with them.

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This is why I feel like one is the best option.

It's a crapshoot and you could get a bad apple, but at least you can talk directly to and try to influence just one person.

With three you've got multiple moving pieces and even if you've made headway with two it can then get reversed by the third.

P.H. Dexippus said:

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What's the latest the District releases valuations? Still waiting on ours...

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Don't I know it. Pretty crazy because last year was my first year arguing on this joke and they nailed me to the wall on my purchase price but backed off a whole lot this year. I'll take it.

I had my informal protest meeting with Travis County today and it was an interesting contrast to HCAD. They let me go through everything and then immediately came back with an offer that was 5% higher than the noticed value. I told her to go ahead and schedule me for the formal hearing because Texas Law prohibits what they were trying to do.

In 77079 and went through iSettle and their counter was only a 2% decrease in proposed value.I rejected it but don't really want to go through the hassle of a formal hearing.

Is it too late to bring on a property tax consultant?

Not too late for jubally

aTm_bomb said:

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Not too late for jubally

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Jubally has been my go to for years... this year, as always, I wanted until the very last second to submit my protest, but Jubally was saying I could only justify about a $10k drop, so for the for the first time, I decided to go the iSettle route instead of in person. Fast forward a month until now, and suddenly they are saying I can justify a $100k drop. WTH? I would've definitely gone in person to fight for that. Haven't received the isettle that I submitted for a $25k drop, but now I don't want to accept it even if they match my request.

At the end of the day, it's my own fault for being lazy, I should've requested in person informal like always, that way as protests get settled between the submittal deadline and my meeting and my comps drop, I can wait until the day of my meeting to determine how low I'm going to fight for.

Yea I do the same and agree that I don't do Isettle as it locks me into a value earlier. Sounds like a lot of comps had successful disputes to lower their assessed values which in theory would aid your argument. I guess that is good news?

I guess we will find out when I get my offer. I'm not optimistic.

Got a 6% reduction in 77008

I got something similar (although less drastic).

As mentioned, I would imagine it's due to Jubally getting a new tranche of data that included resolved protests from this year.

E said:

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Got a 6% reduction in 77008

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Please god let me get close to this. They got flat stupid with 008's values this year.

I got my jubally number on Isettle ($30k drop), only to have an update a few days later from jubally they have it down another $30k

First time Home Owner and I was denied by iSettle. Not really sure if I did something wrong (i.e. asked for too much or too little) but I noticed that my HCAD file listed a Frame Utility Shed as an extra feature, which according to google street view hasn't been on the property since 2023 and I figured it was worth a shot trying to get a reduction

Is it worth it going to the in-person appeal? Is an "extra feature" something appraisers take into account when determining home value?

The Wonderer said:

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E said:

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Got a 6% reduction in 77008

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Please god let me get close to this. They got flat stupid with 008's values this year.

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In the 008 here and got my offer yesterday. They offered me exactly what I asked for. I was shocked they didn't just meet somewhere in the middle like they normally do. I got an 8.1% reduction in market value from the initial notice. My market and appraised value are now only $3,277 apart, which I think is the closest together they've ever been in the last 20 years.

iSettle gave me exactly what I asked for, and market and appraised are the same.

CheeseSndwch said:

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First time Home Owner and I was denied by iSettle. Not really sure if I did something wrong (i.e. asked for too much or too little) but I noticed that my HCAD file listed a Frame Utility Shed as an extra feature, which according to google street view hasn't been on the property since 2023 and I figured it was worth a shot trying to get a reduction

Is it worth it going to the in-person appeal? Is an "extra feature" something appraisers take into account when determining home value?

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Look at your hearing evidence they gave you. It should show whether they adjusted sales comps due to the shed.

When is the latest anyone has gotten their notice on residential property? I'm in the 008, still waiting.

My 2025 appraised value was 8.2% higher than last year's, 77077. I used the number that came on the Ownwell mailer and submitted that for the iSettle with maybe 3 sentences about how much my house is garbage. Got my offer today and HCAD accepted the offer, which actually lowered the value by 2.4% compared to last year! Nice little swing and very unexpected.

P.H. Dexippus said:

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When is the latest anyone has gotten their notice on residential property? I'm in the 008, still waiting.

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Check your info on HCAD. That will tell you the date the notice was sent. If you did not receive it in the mail, HCAD doesn't care and the deadline to protest is long past.

I check online daily, it's never been noticed. Protest deadline is 30 days after notice, even if May 15th is past.

P.H. Dexippus said:

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I check online daily, it's never been noticed. Protest deadline is 30 days after notice, even if May 15th is past.

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That's good for you in that case. I found out the hard way about 10 years ago.

Crazy Ag 97 said:

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aTm_bomb said:

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Not too late for jubally

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Jubally has been my go to for years... this year, as always, I wanted until the very last second to submit my protest, but Jubally was saying I could only justify about a $10k drop, so for the for the first time, I decided to go the iSettle route instead of in person. Fast forward a month until now, and suddenly they are saying I can justify a $100k drop. WTH? I would've definitely gone in person to fight for that. Haven't received the isettle that I submitted for a $25k drop, but now I don't want to accept it even if they match my request.

At the end of the day, it's my own fault for being lazy, I should've requested in person informal like always, that way as protests get settled between the submittal deadline and my meeting and my comps drop, I can wait until the day of my meeting to determine how low I'm going to fight for.

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Well, I'm not sure what happened but apparently because I submitted a isettle too close to my value, isettle errored out and couldn't do it so I had to actually go have an informal in person.

I think I'm still in shock at what hapoenef at my informal yesterday. Using the Jubally report, I convinced her to give me a market value 4% lower than what I was at last year. My original notice was about a 15% increase so obviously a max 10% increase on my taxable. Total tax savings will be about $1200.

TXTransplant said:

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Mine is out in 77389.

Market up 25%, appraised up 10%.

The market value is nuts. Up from $504612 to $628316. House across the street (that is almost identical) listed last August for $549k. They had to lower the price to $495k to even get an offer, and I've heard the pending offer is significantly below that.

Problem is, the stupid house has been under contract since Jan 9 and still hasn't closed.

I started using a firm last year to handle protests for me. I'll let them fight this battle.

Taxing entities like ISDs and MUDs must use these valuations to estimate tax revenue. I don't see how this isn't fraud on the part of the CAD.

Thankfully, I live in an area where my MUD and ISD tax rates have been decreasing the last few years.

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Had to go to a hearing, but my protest company got my market down to $567,314. Appraised is still up 10% over last year.

To rub salt in the wound, the house I mentioned in my post above finally closed last week...for somewhere between $420 and $482k. And it's slightly larger than mine. I guess that will be the comp for next year's protest.

Absolutely criminal that my original 2025 market value was $628k.

Edited to add that this reduction cost me $213.

I've used BR Lawson over the last 5 years. They had really good success the first 3 or 4 years. Last year was a complete failure, but I forgot to cancel their service and so it automatically renewed for this tax season. To my surprise, I checked this morning and it seems they were successful in bringing the values down to reasonable.

Notice showed Market Increase of about 25% over last year, Appraisal capped at 10%. After protest, market value is down 7% from last year and appraised is up by less than 1%.