It’s time to end the “crushing burden of property taxes” in Texas, former Texas state senator and GOP gubernatorial candidate Don Huffines recently told the Austin Journal.
“Why are we still renting our own property from the government?” Huffines said. “Texans deserve to fully own their homes and other property. The path to eliminating the crushing burden of property taxes is less government spending and eliminating school property taxes.”
Considered one of the largest real estate developers in Dallas, Huffines was first elected to the Texas Senate in 2015 and served until 2019. In 2022, Huffines unsuccessfully challenged incumbent Gov. Greg Abbott in the GOP primary, according to Ballotpedia.
Huffines has recently converted his campaign for governor into an initiative, the Huffines Liberty Foundation, promoting smaller government and conservative social values. The Austin Journal previously reported that according to the chief economist at Texas Public Policy Foundation (TPPF), property taxes have gone up 181% since 2002, meanwhile 76% of Texans say the increasing property taxes have been a major burden on them and their families.
Dick Lavine, senior fiscal analyst for the think tank Every Texan, told the Austin Journal that while he thinks it is too early to panic about rapidly rising property taxes, he understands the public’s alarm and would like to see the legislature take action. According to Lavine, the legislature should allow cities and counties to offer their own flat-dollar homestead exemption and require the disclosure of real estate sales prices to help ensure businesses and industry are paying their fair share of property taxes like homeowners.
According to the Travis Central Appraisal District (TCAD) the median market value for a residential property in Travis County is $632,208 and the median taxable value of a residential property is $338,344 in 2022.
Based on TCAD’s median taxable value of $338,344 and the average tax rate for a residential property in Travis County, median homeowners can expect to pay $6,699 in 2022. Tax-Rates.org reports that Travis County has one of the highest property tax burdens in the United States with residents paying out approximately 4.98% of their yearly income for property taxes.
