Texas Homestead Exemption 2026:
The $140,000 Exemption and What You Save

Add them together and you get the combined rate. Each unit then applies its own exemptions, so the bill on a homestead is lower than the combined rate times the home’s value.

Here are the combined rates for a typical homestead inside each city, and the estimated yearly tax on a $400,000 homestead with each unit’s own exemptions applied:

Scroll horizontally to see all columns

Sources: Tarrant Appraisal District 2026 rates; Dallas County, Johnson County and Ellis County tax office rate lists; Midlothian, Waxahachie and Red Oak ISD 2026 rates. Checked October 23, 2026. Ellis County rows use the county’s proposed 2026 rate, which matches its 2025 rate. Midlothian, Waxahachie and Red Oak city rates are the 2026 rates posted by the Ellis County Tax Office. In-city homes in Midlothian, Waxahachie and Red Oak don’t pay an emergency services district tax (Ellis County 2026 parcel records), and Midlothian ISD gives an extra 10% local homestead exemption. *Some units for these rows couldn’t be confirmed, so the estimate may run slightly low. Estimates leave out over-65 exemptions and the 10% homestead appraisal cap.

Proposition 13 raised the school-district homestead exemption from $100,000 to $140,000. Almost every Texas homeowner uses this exemption, so the savings are broad. Proposition 11 added another $60,000 for homeowners 65 or older, or with a qualifying disability. Stacked together, that's $200,000 off the school-tax portion of an assessed value.

What that means in plain dollars

Take a home assessed at $400,000 in a district with a $1.00 school-tax rate per $100 of value. The old exemption saved you $1,000 a year. The new $140,000 exemption saves you $1,400. A senior stacking Prop 11 takes another $60,000 out of the school-tax base, for $200,000 in all.

Counting the 2023 cuts as well, the Lt. Governor’s office puts the combined school tax cut at $1,762.87 for the average homeowner and $1,933.23 for seniors.

City, county, hospital, and community-college rates still apply to the full assessed value, minus any local exemptions they offer. That's why a $140,000 exemption isn't a flat $140,000 off your bill. It's $140,000 off the taxable base used to calculate the ISD line.

Worked example: $400,000 home in Mansfield

That's the school-tax piece alone. The bigger chunk of your bill still comes from the combined city, county, and hospital rates. But first, let's talk about a common shock for new buyers.

Every realtor has this conversation with a first-year homeowner. You bought in the fall. The seller had a homestead exemption and a long-held appraisal cap. Your October statement looked fine. Then in February, your lender sends a letter saying your escrow is short and your monthly payment is going up $300 or $400. Sometimes more.

Three things are usually happening at once. The prior owner’s 10% cap ended with their homestead exemption, so the next January 1 appraisal can reflect full market value. The homestead exemption is tied to the owner, not the property. When the previous owner sold, their exemption ended, so as the new owner you have to file your own Form 50-114 to claim it. And your initial escrow used the old owner's tax bill as an estimate, which means your lender is now catching up to the real number plus twelve months of under-collection.

There's no way around the one-time reset. But you can soften the blow. File your homestead exemption the week you close, not the year after. Ask your lender for an escrow analysis as soon as the new tax bill lands. And request a spread on the shortage so the shortfall amortizes across 12 months instead of hitting as a lump adjustment.

When a builder finishes your home in, say, July, but the county's January 1 assessment date was six months before the house existed, the CAD only taxes the land that first year. That might be a few hundred dollars for former-farmland, or a few thousand for raw residential dirt. Your lender sees that low first-year tax bill and may offer to set your escrow based on the unimproved value. The next January 1 rolls around, the CAD picks up the full improvement value (the $400K house sitting on what used to be $75K of land), and your escrow shortage jumps $5,000 to $15,000.

For former-farmland subdivisions (common across Ellis and Johnson counties, where cities keep absorbing ag land), there's a twist. If the seller was claiming 1-d-1 agricultural valuation, converting the land to residential use triggers a three-year rollback tax: three years of back-tax on the difference between productivity value and market value, plus interest. It usually settles at closing, but some builders try to pass it to the buyer, so ask your title company to show you exactly where it appears on the closing disclosure.

There's a simple fix. Ask your lender to escrow based on the fully improved value of the finished home, not the unimproved land. Higher monthly payment up front. No year-two surprise.

Mansfield sits in Tarrant, Johnson and Ellis counties, but the school and city rates are the same across town. Mansfield ISD charges $1.1469 per $100 on all three county sides, and the City of Mansfield charges $0.639 per $100 everywhere in the city. What changes at the county line is the county rate: Tarrant County charges $0.186, plus $0.159 for its hospital district and $0.12 for Tarrant County College; Johnson County charges $0.367 plus a $0.05 road levy; Ellis County charges about $0.274 including its road levy.

For a $400,000 homestead, with each taxing unit applying its own exemptions, the yearly bill comes to about $6,600 on the Tarrant side, about $6,600 on the Johnson side and about $6,100 on the Ellis side. That’s a gap of roughly $500 a year, all of it from the county-level units, since the school and city rates match across Mansfield. The Ellis figure uses Ellis County’s proposed 2026 rate, which matches its 2025 rate. The Johnson and Ellis figures may also run slightly low, since we couldn’t confirm whether a college or emergency services district applies there.

Sources: Tarrant Appraisal District 2026 rates; Johnson County Tax Office 2026 rates; Ellis County Tax Office 2025 rates. Checked October 23, 2026.

Most people don't file them all. Here's the full stack, grouped by who qualifies. For the complete list of statutory exemptions and eligibility rules, the Texas Comptroller's exemptions page is the authoritative reference.

The Homestead Appraisal Cap (Automatic)

Once your primary-residence homestead is active, your appraised value can't rise more than 10% per year, no matter what the market does. If your neighbor sells for 20% more, the county can bump your market value but not your taxable appraised value.

The cap starts on January 1 of the tax year after the first year your home qualifies for the homestead exemption (Tax Code §23.23), so it doesn’t protect a new owner’s first year.

Over-65 and Disabled-Person Exemptions

When you turn 65, or if you qualify for Social Security disability benefits (the definition in Tax Code §11.13), three benefits stack on your homestead.

A $60,000 additional school-tax exemption (Proposition 11, November 2025) stacks with the $140,000 homestead. That puts $200,000 of your assessed value out of reach of the school-tax rate.

A school-tax ceiling, often called "the freeze." Your school-tax bill can't rise above the amount you paid the year you qualified, even as the market climbs around you. It's one of the best-hidden benefits in Texas property tax.

Cities and counties can add their own over-65 exemption on top. Tarrant County adds $50,000 and Johnson County $10,000; Ellis County doesn’t offer one. Each city sets its own amount.

If you qualify for both the over-65 and the disability exemption, you can receive both in the same year, but not from the same taxing unit. The benefits are close to identical, but the paperwork differs.

Disabled Veteran Exemptions: Two Separate Programs

This is the most-confused area of Texas property tax, because Texas runs two completely different disabled-veteran exemptions side by side. Most veterans qualify for one or the other, not both.

§11.22 — Partial Disabled Veteran Exemption (10–99% rating)

A flat dollar amount comes off the appraised value of any one property the veteran chooses. It doesn't have to be the homestead. It doesn't have to be a home the veteran owned before moving to Texas. But the veteran has to be a Texas resident. Tier amounts are set by VA disability rating:

• 10%–29% rating (DV1): $5,000 off assessed value
• 30%–49% rating (DV2): $7,500 off assessed value
• 50%–69% rating (DV3): $10,000 off assessed value
• 70%–99% rating (DV4): $12,000 off assessed value

Veterans 65 or older with any disability rating of 10% or more qualify for the top-tier $12,000 exemption regardless of their rating. So do veterans who are blind in one or both eyes, or who have lost use of a limb. Apply with Form 50-135 at your county appraisal district.

§11.131 — 100% Disabled Veteran Homestead Exemption (FULL)

A veteran rated 100% service-connected disabled by the VA owes zero property tax on the homestead. Veterans rated less than 100% schedular but awarded Individual Unemployability (TDIU) at 100% compensation qualify too. No cap on home value. No income test. Every taxing jurisdiction is zeroed out: school, city, county, hospital, junior-college. Not just the school portion.

Bring the VA award letter showing either a 100% rating or the TDIU designation. Apply with the homestead application (Form 50-114) and attach the VA letter.

Clarifications Real Texas Veterans Ask

Surviving Spouse Exemptions

Texas preserves several exemptions for surviving spouses who haven't remarried.

Surviving spouse of a 100% disabled veteran. The full exemption transfers on the same homestead.

Surviving spouse of a service member killed or fatally injured in the line of duty (§11.133). Full homestead exemption. Transfers to a new homestead at full value.

Surviving spouse of a veteran who died from a service-connected condition. This one is brand new. Voters approved it on November 4, 2025 as Proposition 7. The implementing statute took effect January 1, 2026. The exemption follows the spouse to a new homestead if they remain unmarried.

Surviving spouse of a first responder killed in the line of duty (§11.134). Full homestead exemption. Transferable to a new property.

Agricultural and Wildlife Valuations

Technically not an exemption, but a different valuation method. Land used primarily for agriculture, timber, or wildlife management can be appraised at its productivity value instead of market value. Productivity value is usually a tiny fraction of what the land would sell for.

One warning: converting the land to residential use later triggers a rollback tax. You pay back three years of tax savings plus interest. Ag valuations aren't a free ride if you're planning to develop.

What Auto-Renews and What Doesn't

Once granted, the homestead exemption doesn’t need to be re-filed each year. It stays until the home changes owners or you stop qualifying, though the appraisal district can ask you to confirm (Tax Code §11.43).

The disabled-veteran exemption has the most forgiving late-filing rule: five years after the delinquency date.

The notice isn't a bill. It's the district's opinion of what your home is worth, and it determines your taxable value later that fall.

Three numbers matter:

• 1 Market Value — what the district thinks a buyer would pay today. This is the number you protest if it's too high.
• 2 Assessed Value — what you'll actually be taxed on, after the homestead cap. For primary residences, this value can't rise more than 10% a year, no matter what the market does.
• 3 Protest Deadline — usually May 15 or 30 days from the notice date, whichever is later. Miss this and you wait until 2027.

Under Texas Tax Code §41.461, you’re entitled on request to a free copy of the evidence the appraisal district plans to use at your hearing. Request it in writing when you file your protest. That's how you see which comparable sales they used.

If your market value rose more than 10% year-over-year, a protest is almost always worth the hour.

Many work on contingency: no upfront fee, and a share of the first-year savings if they win a reduction. They handle every step from filing through the ARB hearing.

The breakeven math is simple. If your expected savings are $500 and the service charges 40%, you keep $300 and they keep $200. On a straightforward protest you could have filed yourself in 45 minutes, the math favors DIY.

Services earn their fee in four specific cases:

• Homes with unusual characteristics (condition issues, acreage, bed/bath mismatches with comps)
• Multiple properties where scale pays off
• Homeowners who routinely miss filing deadlines or feel intimidated by hearings
• Situations where you think the savings could hit four figures

A reasonable rule of thumb: if your appraised value rose more than 8% and the house is straightforward, file yourself. If the house is unusual or you don't want to deal with it, hire out.

En noviembre de 2025 los votantes de Texas aumentaron la exención de vivienda principal a $140,000 (Proposición 13), con $60,000 adicionales para personas de 65 años o más (Proposición 11). Los ahorros aplican al año fiscal 2025. Su cuenta de impuestos de 2026 ya incluye la exención si usted la tiene registrada.

Para aplicar: descargue el Formulario 50-114 del sitio de su distrito de tasación (TAD para Tarrant, DCAD para Dallas, Ellis CAD, Johnson CAD). El plazo para protestar su tasación es el 15 de mayo o 30 días después de la fecha en que el distrito envía el aviso, lo que sea más tarde.