Tarrant County Property Tax & Sales Tax

Tarrant County Tax Rates - At a Glance

Tarrant County Current Tax Rates Summary

Tax Type	Rate	Notes
Property Tax (combined)	~2.19% of value	No single county rate - the sum of county, city, school district, and special districts. Representative nominal stack; typical effective rate runs lower.
Annual Vehicle (Car) Tax	None	Texas levies no annual value-based vehicle property tax
Sales Tax	8.25%	6.25% state + local portion capped at 2.0%; qualifying groceries exempt
Homestead Exemption	$140,000 school + 10% cap	Over-65 or disabled: additional $60,000 school exemption + school-tax ceiling
Due Date	January 31	Delinquent February 1; protest deadline May 15

Tarrant County Property Tax

Tarrant County property tax comes in two numbers that are easy to confuse. The county's own adopted rate is $0.186200 per $100 of value for the 2025 tax year - exact, from the county's FY2026 adopted budget (Tarrant County M&O $0.173000 + I&S/debt $0.013200), the third straight year the Commissioners Court has cut the rate. But that is only the county government's portion. Your actual bill is the sum of every overlapping taxing unit that covers your parcel: your school district, your city, the county, and the countywide districts (JPS Health Network and Tarrant County College). Combined, the typical total effective rate in Tarrant County is about 1.65% of market value - an estimate from Census ACS 2024 5-year data (median real estate taxes paid $5,334 divided by median home value $323,900). Because the mix of taxing units differs from parcel to parcel, there is no single "Tarrant County rate" for a full bill; the figure below is a worked example.

How a typical Fort Worth bill is built (taxing-unit stack)

School district City County Countywide + water districts

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

Taxing unit	Rate /$100	Type
Fort Worth ISD	$1.0291	School
City of Fort Worth	$0.6700	City
Tarrant County	$0.186200	County
JPS Health Network (Tarrant County Hospital District)	$0.1650	Countywide
Tarrant County College (community college district)	$0.11228	Countywide
Tarrant Regional Water District	$0.0265	Special
Nominal total	~$2.1891	~2.19%

County rate from the Tarrant County FY2026 adopted budget; the other unit rates are each unit's adopted 2025 rate as announced at adoption (Fort Worth ISD Aug 26, City of Fort Worth Sept 16, JPS Sept 22, TCC Aug 21, TRWD board vote). This example is for a City of Fort Worth / Fort Worth ISD parcel; your total depends on your city, school district, and special districts.

Two things stand out. First, the school district ($1.0291) is the single largest slice - on its own it is more than five times the entire Tarrant County levy ($0.186200). Second, the nominal stacked rate of about $2.1891 per $100 (~2.19%) is higher than the ACS effective rate of about 1.65%. That gap is mostly exemptions: the school district, the biggest unit, only taxes value above the $140,000 homestead exemption, and Tarrant County and JPS each knock 20% off a homestead's value before their rates apply, so the rate people actually pay on market value is lower than simply adding the posted rates together.

Where your property-tax dollar goes

School district ~47% City ~31% County ~9% JPS + TCC + TRWD ~14%

On a typical City of Fort Worth / Fort Worth ISD parcel, the school district is about 47% of the bill (Fort Worth ISD $1.0291 / $2.1891 nominal total). The city is roughly 31%, Tarrant County about 9%, and the countywide and water districts (JPS Health Network, Tarrant County College, and the Tarrant Regional Water District) about 14% combined. Percentages are rounded and use the nominal posted rates before any exemption.

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. For a Fort Worth ISD parcel, that 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, plus a school-tax ceiling (freeze) that caps the school portion of the bill going forward. The school-district exemption lowers the school-district taxable value only - but in Tarrant County two other units also give homeowners a break: Tarrant County and JPS Health Network each grant a 20% local homestead exemption, the maximum percentage allowed by state law. Check your parcel's full exemption list with the Tarrant Appraisal District (TAD).

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.

Worked example: on a $350,000 Fort Worth ISD home with a homestead exemption, the school district taxes only $350,000 - $140,000 = $210,000, while Tarrant County and JPS tax $280,000 (after their 20% exemptions) and the remaining units tax up to the full value. That single school-district difference is why the exemption matters most against the largest unit.

Key dates: Tarrant County property tax is due January 31 and becomes delinquent February 1, when a 6% penalty plus 1% interest begins and increases monthly. To challenge your value, file a protest with the Tarrant Appraisal District (TAD) by May 15, or 30 days after your appraisal notice is mailed, whichever is later.

How to protest your appraisal

You can pursue an informal review with a TAD appraiser, a formal Appraisal Review Board (ARB) hearing, or TAD's online protest process. File and track everything at tad.org. 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 Tarrant County property tax

Sources: Tarrant County FY2026 Adopted Budget - Property Tax Rate History (county rate, 2025), each taxing unit's adopted 2025 rate announcement (Fort Worth ISD, City of Fort Worth, JPS, TCC, TRWD), Tarrant Appraisal District (exemptions, protest, dates), and Census ACS 2024 5-year estimates (typical effective rate).

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 Tarrant 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 Tarrant County you register and title through the Tarrant County Tax Office.

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.

Tarrant County Sales Tax

The combined sales tax rate in the City of Fort Worth is 8.25%. It is built from a state rate plus three local components - and Tarrant County itself levies no county sales tax.

Fort Worth (Tarrant County) sales tax components

Component	Rate
Texas state rate	6.25%
City of Fort Worth	1.00%
Fort Worth Crime Control and Prevention District	0.50%
Trinity Metro (transit)	0.50%
Tarrant County	0.00%
Combined rate	8.25%

Texas law caps the total local portion at 2.0%. This is a shared ceiling, not additive past 2%: once city, transit, and any special-purpose district rates add up to 2%, no further local rate can stack on top. That is why 8.25% is the maximum combined sales tax anywhere in Texas, including Tarrant County. Qualifying groceries are exempt from sales tax.

Real Example: a $350,000 Fort Worth Home

Here is how the numbers flow on a representative $350,000 City of Fort Worth / Fort Worth ISD home with a homestead exemption (owner under 65), using the school-district homestead only:

• Market value: $350,000.
• Homestead exemption: the school-district homestead exemption removes $140,000 from the Fort Worth ISD taxable value, so the school district taxes $210,000. The city, county, and districts tax the full $350,000 in this simplified example (the county and JPS 20% local homestead exemptions would lower those lines further).
• Stacked total: school $210,000 × 1.0291% = ~$2,161; city $350,000 × 0.6700% = ~$2,345; county $350,000 × 0.1862% = ~$652; JPS + TCC + TRWD on $350,000 = ~$1,063.
• Estimated annual bill: about $6,221 per year.
• Monthly equivalent: about $518 per month.
• Effective rate: about 1.78% of market value in this simplified example - the county-wide ACS median effective rate is closer to 1.65% once the county and JPS 20% homestead exemptions and other local-option exemptions are applied.

Limitations:

• Your total varies by school district, city, and any special district covering your parcel.
• Local-option exemptions (Tarrant County and JPS 20% homestead, plus over-65, disability, disabled-veteran) vary by unit and can lower the bill further; this simplified example applies only the school-district homestead.
• New-construction homes are often taxed on land only in the first year, then jump once the structure is on the roll.
• A newly purchased home can reset toward your purchase price in year two, before your own homestead cap takes hold.
• This is an estimate, not a parcel-exact bill. The typical effective rate is a Census ACS estimate, not a guaranteed rate.