Texas Homestead laws

[thohome]

Homestead laws were put in place to protect you from losing your property to creditors.

Texas homestead law exempts qualifying real property from forced sale by general creditors. In Texas, every family and every single adult person is entitled to a homestead exempt from seizure for claims of creditors, except for encumbrances properly fixed on homestead property.(2) Traditionally, courts have liberally construed the homestead protections in the accomplishment of their objective.

II. Types of Homestead: Urban and rural

A. Generally

A homestead must be either urban property or rural property. An urban homestead may be a home or a place of business, or both, so long as the urban residential homestead and the urban business homestead in the aggregate do not exceed one acre.(3) There is no limitation of value on urban or rural homesteads, only of size. Rural homesteads are limited to 200 acres for a family and 100 acres for a single adult, which may be held in one or more parcels, with improvements thereon, and an urban homestead is limited to one acre, which may be in one or more lots, with improvements thereon.(4) However, a Senate Joint Resolution was passed by the 76th Legislature to amend the Texas Constitution that will, if approved by Texas voters on November 2, 1999, increase the maximum urban homestead exemption to ten acres.(5) A determination of the homestead character as rural or urban is important for it will affect such issues as the amount of acreage subject to exemption and the eligibility of the property to qualify as a business homestead.

Learn more on Homestead laws of Texas



Check your local real estate laws in your area to see how they may benifit you.

[badmomma]

That is nice to know. I don't have property in Texas but I do
in Michigan. I will check and see how well or if I am at all
protected here. Thank you for sharing this it will help me
to know where I stand.

[missmanors]

This is certainly nice to know, though I don't have property in Texas either. At least it's possible that there are similar laws in other states, and this gives us somewhere to begin checking to see if we do have any such protection.

[thohome]

My father fell under the Homestead laws here in ohio and it also made his taxes each year for his house and property alot lower. So check and see if you qualify and what your homestead laws are in your state it could really be helpful.

[hometowngrl53]

I am pretty sure that the homestead law are they same in each state that you have to be 65 or older and or be or have some sort of disability it is made to help the older folks keep the property taxes lower for them and keep them for getting in debt with the taxes