Flower Mound Bumps Homestead Exemption to 20% — The Maximum Allowed by State Law

When your property tax bill shows up later this year, the number on it should be lower than last year's — and you didn't have to protest, hire anyone, or fill out a single form to make it happen.

On June 16, the Flower Mound Town Council voted unanimously to raise the town's residential homestead exemption from 12.5% to 20%, the ceiling Texas state law allows any municipality to set. The agenda originally called for a bump to 17.5%. The council looked at that number and decided there was no reason to stop short. Deputy Mayor Pro Tem Adam Schiestel put it plainly: "I'm having a hard time finding a rationale to go to 17.5% if we can go to 20%."

Hard to argue with that math. On a home at the town's average appraised value of $465,000, Chief Financial Officer John Zagurski calculated the savings at around $352 a year — based on the current tax rate of $0.387278 per $100 of assessed value. That's real money. Not a rounding error.

The exemption works by shaving 20% off your home's taxable value before the rate is applied. On a $465,000 home, you're taxed as if it's worth about $372,000. The town has been stepping this number up every year since 2018, when it started at a modest 2.5%. It hit 5% in 2021, 10% in 2022, 12.5% in 2023 — and now it's maxed out. There's nowhere left to go under current state law, though Zagurski mentioned the town may look at lobbying Austin to raise that cap.

Who gets this? Every homeowner whose primary residence is in Flower Mound. Doesn't matter if you just bought last year or have been here since before the toll road opened. If you've already filed for the exemption, you don't have to reapply — it rolls forward automatically. New homeowners who haven't filed yet can do so through the Denton County Appraisal District (or Tarrant, depending on where your parcel falls).

Who doesn't get it? Renters see nothing from this. Neither do landlords, commercial property owners, or anyone whose Flower Mound address isn't a primary homestead. The trade-off is explicit: by shrinking the homestead base, the town shifts a larger share of the tax burden onto non-homesteaded and commercial properties.

The town says it expects to hold its tax rate steady despite the exemption increase — meaning no rate hike is planned to offset the lost revenue. Watch the fall budget process to see if that holds.

One resident who spoke at the June 16 meeting put the exemption in blunter terms: "I do feel it's a band-aid to the problem." He's not wrong. Home values in Flower Mound keep climbing, and the 10% annual cap on taxable-value increases only delays the pain — it doesn't stop it. A $352 break today still leaves a lot of homeowners staring at bills that have doubled over the past several years. The exemption is the one lever the council actually controls. They pulled it as far as it goes. What happens next depends on Austin.