Alabama property tax appeals

In Alabama, your county assessor determines the fair market value of your home, and if you own and occupy it as your primary residence, it falls into Class III and is assessed at 10 percent of that value. A recent law, HB73, added a new cap on top of that: your TAXABLE assessed value can now rise by at most 7 percent a year, even in a year when the county raises your true market value faster. That cap applies only to the taxable value used to calculate your bill, not to the county's underlying market value determination, so a gap can open between the two. You can still appeal your fair market value to the county Board of Equalization; the cap legislation did not change that process. An appeal is most likely to help when your county's market value itself looks wrong, comparable sales show it is too high, or the record has an error, not simply because your bill went up. This is general information, not tax advice.