If you own and live in your Texas home, your school-district homestead exemption is now $140,000 — up from $100,000. Voters locked that in by approving Proposition 13 in November 2025, and because it amended the state constitution, it’s the standing rule going forward: it first applied (retroactively) to the 2025 tax year and carries through to your 2026 bill. For most homeowners that’s a real cut to the largest single piece of the property-tax bill — but the headline number hides several catches that determine whether you actually see $40,000 of relief, a smaller cut, or almost nothing.
Here’s exactly what changed, what it does and doesn’t reduce, and how to make sure you’re getting it.
What Proposition 13 actually changed
The Texas Constitution requires school districts to exempt a slice of every qualified homeowner’s home value from school taxation. Proposition 13 (on the ballot as SJR 2) raised that slice from $100,000 to $140,000. Voters passed it on November 4, 2025 with roughly 79% in favor, and a temporary provision made it apply retroactively to tax year 2025. The implementing law is Senate Bill 4 from the 89th Legislature.
The Texas Comptroller now states the rule plainly: Tax Code § 11.13(b) requires school districts to provide a $140,000 exemption on a residence homestead.
On the same ballot, voters approved Proposition 11 (Senate Bill 23), which raised the additional school exemption for homeowners who are 65 or older or disabled from $10,000 to $60,000. Stacked on top of the general exemption, that means a qualifying senior or disabled homeowner now shields $200,000 of value ($140,000 + $60,000) from school taxes.
| School homestead exemption | Before 2025 | Tax year 2025 onward |
|---|---|---|
| General homeowner (Tax Code § 11.13(b)) | $100,000 | $140,000 |
| Additional, age 65+ or disabled (§ 11.13(c)) | $10,000 | $60,000 |
| Total for a qualifying senior/disabled homeowner | $110,000 | $200,000 |
Catch #1: It only cuts the school part of your bill
This is the most-misunderstood point. The $140,000 exemption applies only to school-district maintenance-and-operations (M&O) taxes. It does nothing for the taxes your city, county, hospital district, college district, or other special districts charge, and it does not touch the school district’s “I&S” debt-service rate that pays off bonds.
Your school M&O taxes are usually the biggest line on the bill, so the cut is meaningful — but your total bill won’t fall by anything close to the full exemption. To see how the non-school pieces stack up where you live, check your county page, such as Harris County, Dallas County, Tarrant County, Bexar County, or Travis County.
How much the extra $40,000 is actually worth
The dollar savings depend entirely on your school district’s M&O tax rate. The math is simple: the extra $40,000 of exemption, multiplied by that rate. If your district’s M&O rate is, say, $0.75 per $100 of value, the additional exemption trims about $300 off your school taxes ($40,000 ÷ 100 × $0.75). A district with a higher rate saves you more; a lower rate, less.
Combined with the rest of the 2025 relief package, state officials and the Texas Tribune estimated the average homeowner would save on the order of several hundred dollars a year — more for seniors who also get the larger Proposition 11 exemption. Run the numbers against your own school M&O rate rather than trusting a statewide average.
Catch #2: If your home is worth less than $140,000, the extra room is wasted
An exemption can only reduce your taxable value to zero — it can’t generate a refund. A homeowner whose school-taxable value is already at or below $140,000 now owes $0 in school M&O tax, which is a genuine win. But the additional headroom above their home’s value does nothing, and the exemption can’t be redirected to lower their city or county taxes. In lower-value areas, many homeowners were already near zero school tax under the old $100,000 exemption, so Prop 13 changes little for them while delivering full value to owners of higher-priced homes.
Where the missing money comes from
Cutting $40,000 of taxable value off millions of homesteads would normally gut school budgets. To prevent that, both SB 4 and SB 23 include “hold-harmless” provisions: the state is required to backfill the revenue school districts lose, including funding to cover their existing debt-service (I&S) payments. In other words, the relief doesn’t shrink school funding — it shifts the cost from local homeowners onto the state budget.
That shift is expensive. The Legislative Budget Board’s fiscal note for SB 4 put the cost to state general revenue at roughly $2.7 billion through the 2026–27 biennium, on top of the billions already committed in prior relief rounds. That raises the obvious sustainability question: every dollar of property-tax relief delivered this way becomes a recurring obligation the state has to fund out of sales-tax and other revenue in future budgets.
It’s a live debate. In December 2025, Gov. Greg Abbott went further and floated eliminating school M&O property taxes entirely — a far larger backfill that critics warn could strain the budget in a downturn. That remains a proposal, not law; Proposition 13’s $140,000 exemption is what’s actually in effect now — for the 2025 tax year and continuing into 2026.
What to do next
- Confirm your homestead exemption is on file. The bigger exemption only helps if your appraisal district has your homestead application processed. You don’t have to reapply each year, but if you’ve never filed — or you recently moved — file with your county appraisal district now. There’s no fee to file directly.
- Check your tax bill. The $140,000 exemption first applied to tax year 2025 (the bill that was due by January 31, 2026) and continues for 2026. It should show up in the school-tax line; if it doesn’t, contact your appraisal district.
- Seniors and disabled homeowners: make sure your over-65 or disability exemption is also recorded, so you get the full $200,000 in combined school exemptions.
- Know what didn’t change. Your appraised value can still rise, and your city, county, and other districts set their own rates. Read your Notice of Appraised Value when it arrives and protest if the value looks wrong.
- For background on how the exemption works and earlier changes, see our guide to the Texas homestead exemption and the new law. For other 2025 shifts, see why the 20% appraisal cap expires after 2026 and why so many school districts asked voters for rate hikes.
Sources
- Texas Comptroller — Property Tax Exemptions ($140,000 under Tax Code § 11.13(b); $60,000 additional under § 11.13(c))
- Texas Legislature — SB 4, 89th Legislature (raises general school homestead exemption to $140,000)
- SB 4 bill text and fiscal note (hold-harmless and state cost)
- Texas Legislature — SB 23, 89th Legislature (raises age-65/disabled additional exemption to $60,000)
- Texas Legislature — SJR 2 (Proposition 13)
- The Texas Tribune — Texas voters approve property-tax breaks (Nov. 4, 2025)
- The Texas Tribune — Abbott’s plan to cut school property taxes (Dec. 2025)