Cherokee County Property Tax & Sales Tax

Cherokee County Tax Rates - At a Glance

Cherokee 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, and county on a City of Jacksonville / Jacksonville ISD parcel. Representative nominal stack; typical effective rate runs about 1.16% of market value.
County's own rate	$0.490000 / $100	Cherokee County government portion only (County general $0.350000 + Lateral Road $0.140000)
Hospital / college district	None	Cherokee County has no countywide hospital district and no community college taxing district
Annual Vehicle (Car) Tax	None	Texas levies no annual value-based vehicle property tax
Sales Tax	8.25%	6.25% state + 0.50% Cherokee County + 1.50% city (Jacksonville); 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

Cherokee County Property Tax

Cherokee County property tax comes in two numbers that are easy to confuse. The county's own adopted rate is $0.490000 per $100 of value for the 2025 tax year - and it is only the Cherokee 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), and the county. Combined, the typical total effective rate in Cherokee County is about 1.16% of market value - an estimate from Census ACS 2024 5-year data (median real estate taxes paid $1,963 divided by median home value $169,300). Because the mix of taxing units differs from parcel to parcel, there is no single "Cherokee County rate" for a full bill; the figures below are worked examples.

Cherokee County's own rate of $0.490000 is posted as two units: a general County rate ($0.350000) and a dedicated Lateral Road rate ($0.140000) for county road maintenance. It keeps bills near the statewide norm because the county has no countywide hospital district and no community college taxing district - two lines that inflate bills in many Texas counties - so a typical Cherokee County bill is a clean three-unit stack of school, city, and county. One local wrinkle: the Bullard area on the northern edge, shared with Smith County, falls in Bullard ISD, whose rate ($1.246900) is well above the county's other school districts.

How a typical Cherokee County (City of Jacksonville) bill is built (taxing-unit stack)

School district City County

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

Taxing unit	Rate /$100	Type
Jacksonville ISD	$1.061900	School
City of Jacksonville	$0.637630	City
Cherokee County (incl. Lateral Road)	$0.490000	County
Nominal total	~$2.189530	~2.19%

Rates from the Cherokee Central Appraisal District 2025 Tax Rate Sheet. This example is for a City of Jacksonville / Jacksonville ISD parcel; your total depends on your city and school district. Other school districts include Rusk ISD ($0.781700), Troup ISD ($0.832419), Alto ISD ($1.056900), Wells ISD ($0.911900), New Summerfield ISD ($1.020300), and Bullard ISD ($1.246900). Other cities that levy a property tax include Rusk ($0.486404), Troup ($0.498767), Alto ($0.272149), Wells ($0.380387), and Bullard ($0.554703). Rural and unincorporated parcels pay no city rate.

Where your property-tax dollar goes

Jacksonville ISD ~48.5% City ~29.1% County ~22.4%

On a typical City of Jacksonville / Jacksonville ISD parcel, Jacksonville ISD is about 48.5% of the nominal bill ($1.061900 / $2.1895 nominal total), the City of Jacksonville about 29.1%, and Cherokee County about 22.4%. 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 1.16%) sits well below the nominal stacked rate (about 2.19%).

Who appraises, bills, and collects in Cherokee County

• The Cherokee Central Appraisal District sets appraised values, processes homestead exemptions, and runs protests, at cherokeecad.com.
• The Cherokee County Tax Assessor-Collector collects the property tax and also handles vehicle registration and titling, at tax.co.cherokee.tx.us.

For value questions, start with the appraisal district; to pay, start with the Cherokee 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 Cherokee Central Appraisal District. For a Jacksonville 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 Cherokee 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 Cherokee Central 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 a Cherokee County-specific 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 Cherokee Central Appraisal District, which publishes its protest procedures and deadlines and runs the property search and appeals process. File and track everything at cherokeecad.com. 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 Cherokee County property tax

Sources: Cherokee Central Appraisal District 2025 Tax Rate Sheet (county rate and the Jacksonville-area unit rates), the Cherokee Central 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 Cherokee 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 Cherokee County you register and title through the Cherokee 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.

Cherokee County Sales Tax

The combined sales tax rate in the City of Jacksonville is 8.25% - the Texas maximum. It is made up of the 6.25% state rate, a 0.50% Cherokee County rate, and a 1.50% city rate. Cherokee 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 Jacksonville (Cherokee County) sales tax components

Component	Rate
Texas state rate	6.25%
Cherokee County	0.50%
City of Jacksonville (local)	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. Outside city limits the rate is 6.75% (state plus the countywide 0.50%). The exact city-versus-economic-development split of the Jacksonville local rate varies. Groceries and most unprepared food are exempt from sales tax.

Real Example: a $169,300 Jacksonville Home

Here is how the numbers flow on a representative $169,300 City of Jacksonville / Jacksonville 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: $169,300.
• Homestead exemption: the $140,000 school-district exemption drops the Jacksonville ISD taxable value to $29,300. The other units tax the full $169,300 in this simplified example.
• Stacked total: school $29,300 × 1.061900% = ~$311; city $169,300 × 0.637630% = ~$1,080; county $169,300 × 0.490000% = ~$830.
• Estimated annual bill: about $2,221 per year.
• Monthly equivalent: about $185 per month.
• Effective rate: about 1.31% of market value in this simplified example.

How this compares to the county-wide median. The Census ACS county-wide median bill is about $1,963 (roughly 1.16% effective). This Jacksonville city example lands above that, and that is expected: Jacksonville is an incorporated city carrying a full stack, while much of Cherokee County is unincorporated Piney Woods with no city rate. A homesteaded parcel with no city rate (school + county, roughly $1,141 on the same $169,300 value) would pay closer to 0.67%, and a real over-65 homestead - with the extra $60,000 school exemption and any local-option amounts - would be lower still. A non-homestead $169,300 Jacksonville parcel would pay closer to the full nominal ~2.19%, or about $3,707.

Limitations:

• Your total varies by school district and city; a Rusk, Troup, Alto, Wells, New Summerfield, Bullard, or rural 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.
• Cherokee County's exact 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.