Property Tax Reform

We’ve been hearing for years about unfair tax breaks for big corporations while everyone else pays the full bill. When it comes to property taxes, that’s not just rhetoric — it’s real. There is a loophole, and it lets large property owners use undervalued properties to argue down their own tax bills. That shifts the burden onto homeowners, renters, and small businesses. We need to close that loophole first. Only then can we fairly consider a different mass-appraisal method for the investment residential market.

Popp's Law

Big corporations have been using a loophole called Popp’s Law to cut their property taxes by pointing to other undervalued properties and demanding the same lowball treatment — even when their own property is worth far more. That means homeowners and small businesses can end up carrying more of the tax load while big investors lawyer up for special breaks.

Popp’s Law lets big property owners say: “Don’t tax me fairly — tax me as unfairly low as the lowest people around me.” That turns underassessment into a legal tax break for corporations.

I support fixing this loophole so property taxes are based on real value and equal treatment, not who has the best tax attorneys.

How to fix it

The cleanest fix is:

1. Stop using raw low appraisals as the benchmark.

2. Require proof based on appraisal ratios or real market evidence instead.

3. Tighten the rules on what counts as a comparable property.

4. Do not let owners cherry-pick a few lowball properties and call that fairness.

In legislative terms, that means rewriting or sharply limiting § 42.26(a)(3) so corporations cannot automatically force their values down to the median of already-low comparable appraisals. Texas already has ratio-based unequal-appraisal methods elsewhere in the statute, and those are better aligned with real appraisal fairness than a free-form median-comparable-value shortcut.