18,462 single-family homes with a Kingwood mailing address, the lowest missing-homestead rate in this set — and what an older, long-tenured neighbourhood should be checking instead.
Check your home FREE →| What HCAD's records show | Kingwood | All of Harris County |
|---|---|---|
| Single-family homes counted (state class A1) | 18,462 | 1,157,293 |
| No homestead exemption on record | 2,930 (15.9%) | 328,310 (28.4%) |
| Median appraised value | $335,752 | $279,813 |
| Median appraised value per square foot | $113.39 | $111.97 |
| Middle 80% of homes, per square foot | $93.67 – $140.39 | $84.36 – $184.69 |
| Median year of the primary structure | 1986 | 1990 |
Against the county: 15.9% here versus 28.4% across all of Harris County (328,310 of 1,157,293 single-family homes) — Kingwood runs 12.5 percentage points below the county rate.
Kingwood has the lowest share of missing homestead exemptions of any place in this set — 2,930 of 18,462 homes, or 15.9%, against a county rate of 28.4%. In plain terms, Kingwood-addressed homes are a little over half as likely to be missing a homestead exemption on record as the county average. That is the fingerprint of a long-tenured, owner-occupied community: the median primary structure dates to about 1986, and most of those owners filed their exemption years ago.
Which means the useful advice for Kingwood is different from everywhere else on this site. If your exemption is already on file, the money is not in the exemption — it is in the value. The median Kingwood home is appraised at $335,752 at a median $113.39 per square foot, with the middle 80% between $93.67 and $140.39. And in a neighbourhood built mostly in the 1980s, the second place to look is age: at 65 the additional $60,000 school exemption under §11.13(c) and the school tax ceiling under §11.26 both become available, and both are claimed on the same free form as the original homestead application.
Two honest caveats specific to Kingwood. First, Kingwood was annexed by the City of Houston in 1996, and a large share of Kingwood-area accounts carry Houston as the owner's mailing city rather than Kingwood — so this page counts a genuine subset of the area, not all of it. Second, the northern Kings Manor and Kings Mill sections sit in Montgomery County and are not on HCAD's roll at all; if your notice comes from the Montgomery Central Appraisal District, nothing here applies to your account.
A 1980s house does not depreciate on HCAD's roll the way it does in real life unless someone tells the district what has changed. Condition-based arguments — foundation movement, a roof at the end of its life, original systems, deferred repairs — are legitimate protest grounds, and they are evidenced with dated photographs, written repair estimates and contractor bids, not with opinion. If you are protesting on condition, gather that evidence and upload it through your owners.hcad.org account well ahead of the hearing date rather than bringing it with you.
The second item is the one households leave on the table for years: turning 65. The over-65 exemption is not automatic, it is not the same thing as the general homestead exemption, and under §11.43(k) you have until the first anniversary of qualifying to apply. If a home has been in the same hands since the 1980s and nobody has touched the exemption paperwork since, that is the single cheapest thing to check on this page — and it is free.
There are three ways to file, and all three are held to that same deadline: online through iFile at owners.hcad.org, by mail, or in person at Harris Central Appraisal District, 13013 Northwest Freeway, Houston, TX 77040-6305. Online is the only route that connects to iSettle, HCAD's electronic settlement-offer process, which resolves a large share of protests without a hearing.
The full walkthrough lives in our free guides rather than being repeated on every area page: the complete Harris County protest guide, how to file online through HCAD iFile, and what actually happens at an ARB hearing. If the deadline has already passed, §41.44(b) late protests and the other remedies are covered honestly there, including what they do not cover.
Exemptions are separate from a protest, they are free to file, and they are not filed through iFile. For most households they are also the bigger number — a protest argues about value, an exemption takes value out of the tax base outright.
| Exemption | What it does | Statute |
|---|---|---|
| General residence homestead | $140,000 off the value your school district taxes, on a home you own and live in as your main residence | Tax Code §11.13(b) |
| Age 65 or older, or disabled | Another $60,000 off school-district value on top of the $140,000. From any one taxing unit you take the age-65 or the disability exemption — not both (§11.13(h)) | Tax Code §11.13(c) |
| Filing homestead late | A late residence homestead application must be accepted and decided if it is filed within two years of the delinquency date for those taxes; tax already paid is refunded without a separate application | Tax Code §11.431 |
| Filing disabled-veteran late | Disabled veterans get a far longer window — up to five years after the delinquency date | Tax Code §11.439 |
Full detail on each: the homestead exemption guide, the over-65 exemption and school tax ceiling, and the disabled-veteran exemptions.
Because it counts accounts whose owner mailing city is recorded as "Kingwood" in HCAD's records. Kingwood was annexed into the City of Houston in 1996 and many Kingwood-area accounts carry a Houston mailing city instead, so the real area is larger than this count. It is an honest subset, not a boundary.
Two things. If anyone on the deed is now 65 or older, the additional $60,000 school-district exemption under §11.13(c) and the school tax ceiling under §11.26 are separate claims on the same free form and are not granted automatically. And a house from the mid-1980s is at the age where condition — foundation, roof, original systems — is a legitimate protest ground, evidenced with photographs and written repair estimates.
Texas Tax Code §41.44 sets it at May 15, or the 30th day after HCAD delivered your Notice of Appraised Value, whichever is LATER. It is not always May 15 — if your notice arrived late, the later date is the one that governs. You can file online through iFile at owners.hcad.org, by mail, or in person at Harris Central Appraisal District, 13013 Northwest Freeway, Houston, TX 77040-6305.
Yes. Checking what HCAD has on record for your home costs nothing and takes about a minute. Filing an exemption — homestead, over-65, disability, veteran, disaster — is also free: HCAD publishes the application as Form 11.13 and the Texas Comptroller publishes the identical form as 50-114, both at no charge. Anyone charging you a fee to file a homestead exemption is charging you for a free government form.
No. We are not attorneys and not tax agents, and we do not represent anyone before HCAD or the Appraisal Review Board. We prepare the forms and the comparable-property evidence; you file it yourself under your own account. iFile requires your own login tied to your own account number and PIN, so the protest stays on your own record.
Last updated: July 31, 2026. Property figures computed from Harris Central Appraisal District's public appraisal roll (single-family state class A1, vacant-lot records excluded), joined to HCAD's exemption records. Sources: Harris Central Appraisal District, hcad.org and owners.hcad.org; Texas Tax Code §41.44, §11.13, §11.431 and §11.439. This page is general information for Harris County homeowners, not legal or tax advice. Appraisal figures reflect the roll as loaded and change every year — verify your own account with HCAD before you rely on anything here.