Anderson County Property Tax & Sales Tax

Anderson County Tax Rates - At a Glance

Anderson County Current Tax Rates Summary

Tax Type	Rate	Notes
Property Tax (combined)	~2.19% of value	No single county rate - the sum of school district, city, county, and Trinity Valley Community College on a City of Palestine / Palestine ISD parcel. Representative nominal stack; typical effective rate runs about 0.92% of market value.
County's own rate	$0.493907 / $100	Anderson County government portion only: M&O $0.457475 + debt (I&S) $0.036432
Hospital / college district	College yes, hospital no	Trinity Valley Community College $0.045040 (Palestine area; $0.113660 in Frankston/LaPoynor); no countywide hospital district
Annual Vehicle (Car) Tax	None	Texas levies no annual value-based vehicle property tax
Sales Tax	8.25%	6.25% state + 0.50% Anderson County + 1.50% city (Palestine); groceries and most unprepared food exempt
Homestead Exemption	$140,000 school + 10% cap	Statutory school-district homestead; over-65 owners get an additional $60,000 school exemption.
Due Date	January 31	Delinquent February 1; statewide protest deadline May 15

Anderson County Property Tax

Anderson County property tax comes in two numbers that are easy to confuse. The county's own adopted rate is $0.493907 per $100 of value for the 2025 tax year - and it is only the Anderson County government's portion. Your actual bill is the sum of every overlapping taxing unit that covers your parcel: your school district, your city (if any), the county, and the Trinity Valley Community College district. Combined, the typical total effective rate in Anderson County is about 0.92% of market value - an estimate from Census ACS 2024 5-year data (median real estate taxes paid $1,702 divided by median home value $185,300). Because the mix of taxing units differs from parcel to parcel, there is no single "Anderson County rate" for a full bill; the figures below are worked examples.

Anderson County's own rate of $0.493907 is a single county levy, split for accounting into a maintenance-and-operations rate ($0.457475) and a debt or interest-and-sinking rate ($0.036432). On top of the county, most parcels also carry the Trinity Valley Community College district ($0.045040 on a Palestine parcel; the Frankston and LaPoynor areas use a $0.113660 branch rate instead). There is no countywide hospital district. Palestine is the county seat and largest city, an East Texas railroad town in the Piney Woods known for the Texas State Railroad and its spring Dogwood Trails; Frankston and Elkhart are the other incorporated cities.

How a typical Anderson County (City of Palestine) bill is built (taxing-unit stack)

School district City County Community college

City of Palestine / Palestine ISD parcel - adopted rates per $100 (2025 tax year)

Taxing unit	Rate /$100	Type
Palestine ISD	$1.037800	School
City of Palestine	$0.614285	City
Anderson County	$0.493907	County
Trinity Valley Community College	$0.045040	College
Nominal total	~$2.191032	~2.19%

Rates from the Anderson County Truth-in-Taxation Summary (Section 26.16) for 2025. This example is for a City of Palestine / Palestine ISD parcel; your total depends on your city and school district. Other school districts include Cayuga ISD ($1.0752), Westwood ISD ($1.0016), Elkhart ISD ($0.9911), Neches ISD ($0.9610), Frankston ISD ($0.9204), and Slocum ISD ($0.9139). Unincorporated Palestine ISD parcels pay no city rate (about $1.576747 combined). The Frankston and LaPoynor areas use the $0.113660 TVCC branch rate instead.

Where your property-tax dollar goes

Palestine ISD ~47.4% City ~28.0% County ~22.5% TVCC ~2.1%

On a typical City of Palestine / Palestine ISD parcel, Palestine ISD is about 47.4% of the nominal bill ($1.037800 / $2.191032 nominal total), the City of Palestine about 28.0%, Anderson County about 22.5%, and Trinity Valley Community College about 2.1%. Percentages are rounded and use the nominal posted rates before any exemption - after the $140,000 school-district homestead exemption the taxable amount drops sharply, which is part of why the county's typical effective rate (about 0.92%) sits well below the nominal City-of-Palestine stacked rate (about 2.19%): most Anderson County parcels are rural or in smaller cities with lower city rates, and many carry over-65 school-tax ceilings.

Who appraises, bills, and collects in Anderson County

• The Anderson County Appraisal District sets appraised values, processes homestead exemptions, and runs protests, at andersoncad.net (903-723-2949).
• The Anderson County Tax Assessor-Collector collects the property tax and also handles vehicle registration and titling, at andersoncountytx.gov (search and pay online at tax.co.anderson.tx.us).

For value questions, start with the appraisal district; to pay, start with the Anderson County Tax Assessor-Collector.

Homestead exemption, the 10% cap, and key dates

If you own and occupy your home as your principal residence on January 1, you can claim a residence homestead exemption, and you generally apply through the Anderson County Appraisal District. For a Palestine ISD parcel, the statewide school-district exemption removes $140,000 from the value the school district taxes for the 2025 tax year. If the owner is 65 or older, an additional $60,000 ISD exemption applies.

Some Anderson County cities also grant local-option homestead exemptions, but the exact per-unit amounts vary and were not fully extracted in this pass. Because those interact with each unit's own value, the calculator below models only the statutory $140,000 school-district homestead and treats its output as the conservative (high) end - a real over-65 homestead bill is lower. Confirm the exact exemptions on your account with the Anderson County Appraisal District.

Separately, the 10% homestead appraisal cap limits how much your homestead's appraised (taxed) value can rise to 10% per year, not counting new improvements. The cap applies to the appraised value used for your bill, not the market value the appraisal district sets, and it starts the year after you first qualify for the homestead exemption.

Key dates: payment is due January 31 and unpaid amounts become delinquent February 1. The statewide protest deadline is May 15 or 30 days after your appraisal notice is delivered, whichever is later. Texas Tax Code Section 1.06 rolls any deadline that falls on a weekend or holiday to the next business day. We were not able to extract an Anderson County-specific delinquent penalty-and-interest schedule from an official source in this pass, so no penalty percentages are stated on this page.

How to protest your appraisal

Protests go to the Anderson County Appraisal District, which publishes its protest procedures and deadlines and runs the property search and appeals process. File and track everything at andersoncad.net. Some private firms offer to handle protests for a percentage of any tax savings; such firms exist and charge a contingency fee, but we do not cite any savings figure or success rate as fact - results vary by parcel and year.

Estimate your Anderson County property tax

Sources: Anderson County Truth-in-Taxation Summary (Section 26.16), 2025 (county rate and the Palestine-area unit rates), the Anderson County Appraisal District (appraised values and exemptions), the Texas Comptroller (sales tax), and Census ACS 2024 5-year estimates (typical effective rate). See the tax guides for how Texas homestead, protest, and appraisal-cap rules work.

Vehicle Taxes in Texas

Unlike many states, Texas does not levy an annual value-based property tax on cars or other vehicles. There is no yearly "car tax" bill in Anderson County. Instead, vehicle taxes in Texas work two ways:

• One-time motor-vehicle sales/use tax of 6.25% at purchase. For a private-party sale, the tax is charged on the greater of the actual sales price or 80% of the vehicle's Standard Presumptive Value (SPV). A vehicle received as a gift is taxed at a flat $10 instead.
• A flat annual registration fee (plus any local add-ons), which is a fixed fee, not a tax on the vehicle's value. In Anderson County you register and title through the Anderson County Tax Assessor-Collector.

So if you searched for a Texas car or vehicle sales tax, the answer is the one-time 6.25% charged when the vehicle is titled - there is no recurring vehicle property tax to budget for each year.

Anderson County Sales Tax

The combined sales tax rate in the City of Palestine is 8.25% - the Texas maximum. It is made up of the 6.25% state rate, a 0.50% Anderson County rate, and a 1.50% City of Palestine rate. Anderson County does levy its own 0.50% county sales tax, which applies countywide - so even outside a city the rate is 6.75%. Texas law caps the total local portion at 2.0%, so once the county's 0.50% and the city's 1.50% are combined, no further local rate can stack on top - which is why 8.25% is the maximum combined sales tax here.

City of Palestine (Anderson County) sales tax components

Component	Rate
Texas state rate	6.25%
Anderson County	0.50%
City of Palestine	1.50%
Combined rate	8.25%

The 2.00% local share is the maximum Texas allows and here is split between the 0.50% county rate and the 1.50% city rate. The City of Palestine's 1.50% is itself divided into a general-fund portion, a dedicated street repair-and-maintenance portion, and an economic-development portion. Outside city limits the rate is 6.75% (state plus the countywide 0.50%). Groceries and most unprepared food are exempt from sales tax.

Real Example: a $185,300 Palestine Home

Here is how the numbers flow on a representative $185,300 City of Palestine / Palestine ISD home (the county median value) with a homestead exemption (owner under 65), applying only the school-district homestead to the school unit:

• Market value: $185,300.
• Homestead exemption: the $140,000 school-district exemption drops the Palestine ISD taxable value to $45,300. The other units tax the full $185,300 in this simplified example.
• Stacked total: school $45,300 × 1.037800% = ~$470; city $185,300 × 0.614285% = ~$1,138; county $185,300 × 0.493907% = ~$915; TVCC $185,300 × 0.045040% = ~$83.
• Estimated annual bill: about $2,606 per year.
• Monthly equivalent: about $217 per month.
• Effective rate: about 1.41% of market value in this simplified City-of-Palestine example.

How this compares to the county-wide median. The Census ACS county-wide median bill is about $1,702 (roughly 0.92% effective). This City of Palestine homestead example (~1.41%) lands above the county median because Palestine has a relatively high city rate, while most Anderson County parcels are rural or in smaller cities (or unincorporated with no city rate at all) and many carry over-65 school-tax ceilings. A homesteaded parcel with no city rate (school + county + college, roughly $1,468 on the same $185,300 value) would pay closer to 0.79%, and a real over-65 homestead - with the extra $60,000 school exemption and the school-tax ceiling - would be lower still. A non-homestead $185,300 Palestine parcel would pay closer to the full nominal ~2.19%, or about $4,060.

Limitations:

• Your total varies by school district and city; an Elkhart, Frankston, Cayuga, Westwood, Neches, Slocum, or unincorporated parcel uses a different stack.
• Local-option city homestead exemptions (and over-65, disability, and disabled-veteran exemptions) are not modeled in the simplified example above; this example applies only the school-district homestead, so a real homesteaded city bill is lower.
• Anderson County's exact delinquent penalty-and-interest schedule was not available from an official source in this pass and is not stated here.
• New-construction homes are often taxed on land only in the first year, then jump once the structure is on the roll.
• This is an estimate, not a parcel-exact bill. The typical effective rate is a Census ACS estimate, not a guaranteed rate.