Does Flower Mound's new budget raise your property taxes?

The Town of Flower Mound's proposed 2026-27 budget holds the town tax rate at $0.387277 per $100 of taxable value, the same rate as last year. But under Texas law, "same rate" is not "same taxes." The Town's own certified worksheet puts this year's no-new-revenue rate at $0.370440, so the held rate collects about 4.5% more from the same properties than last year. On a median Flower Mound home, that is roughly $86 a year on the Town line alone, and the Town has already said a voter-approval tax rate election is likely on the way. Your total bill still depends far more on Lewisville ISD and Denton County than on the Town.

Flower Mound's Town Council holds its public hearing and adoption vote on Monday, September 21, and the new budget takes effect October 1. The headline you'll see is "tax rate unchanged." That headline is true, and it is also the least useful number in the whole budget if you're trying to figure out what you'll actually pay next year.

Here's how I walk clients through it.

The rate is flat. The tax is not.

Texas requires every taxing unit to publish two numbers before it adopts a rate. The no-new-revenue rate is the rate that would raise the same total dollars as last year from the properties taxed in both years. The voter-approval rate is the highest rate the unit can adopt without an election.

For 2026, Flower Mound's certified worksheet (signed by the Town's CFO on July 31 and certified by the Denton County Tax Assessor-Collector on July 29) shows:

• No-new-revenue rate: $0.370440
• Proposed rate: $0.387277
• Voter-approval rate: $0.388266

Read those three together and the story changes. The proposed rate sits $0.016837 above the no-new-revenue rate, which is how a "flat" rate turns into a 4.5% increase in what the Town collects from existing homes. It also sits just $0.000989 below the ceiling. On the maintenance-and-operations side, the piece the state caps at 3.5% growth, the Town is proposing $0.334337 against a cap of $0.334559. That is about as close to the line as a city can get without asking voters for more.

This is why the Town's budget page spends so much time on Senate Bill 2. Since 2019, a Texas city can only grow its operating levy 3.5% a year before it has to hold an election. Flower Mound's budget documents say the Town is now running at that limit, holding department budgets flat for a second year, pausing market pay adjustments, and keeping a soft hiring freeze in place. The Town's CFO told the Cross Timbers Gazette in July that a voter-approval tax rate election, a VATRE, is "inevitable," most likely on a 2027 ballot with any change landing in the FY 2028 budget.

So the budget you'll read about this week does two things at once. It holds the rate, and it tells you the rate is not going to hold for long.

What the Town line actually costs on a real Flower Mound home

Let's put numbers on it. Redfin's median sale price in Flower Mound was $640,000 for the three months ending August 2026, up 4.0% from the same period last year. Flower Mound's 20% homestead exemption, the maximum a Texas city can offer, takes that to a taxable value of $512,000 for Town purposes.

• At the proposed $0.387277 rate: $1,982.86 a year, about $165 a month
• At the no-new-revenue rate of $0.370440: $1,896.65 a year
• Difference: $86.21 a year that the flat rate collects and a no-new-revenue rate would not

Now scale it to the homes most of my clients are actually buying. On a $1,500,000 home, the 20% exemption leaves $1,200,000 taxable. The Town line is $4,647.32 at the proposed rate versus $4,445.28 at no-new-revenue, a $202 gap. And if the council someday adopts the full voter-approval rate, that same home pays another $12 a year. The number that matters isn't $12. It is what happens when the Town goes to voters for more than the cap allows.

The Town's own example, on its budget page, is an average homeowner paying about $153 a month to Flower Mound. The Gazette reported the CFO's estimate that a 3.5% increase approved by voters would add roughly $5 a month to that. On a $1.5M home, the same 3.5% is closer to $13.50 a month. Not life-changing, but it compounds, and it is the direction of travel.

One more thing the flat rate hides. If your appraised value rose with the market, your Town bill rose with it. The median home was worth about $615,000 a year ago at Redfin's 4.0% growth figure. At the same $0.387277 rate, that home's Town tax went from roughly $1,907 to $1,983 with nobody voting to raise anything. I covered how that reassessment shows up in your escrow in why your Flower Mound mortgage payment jumps in year two, and the fix, if you haven't filed it, is the homestead exemption, which also caps your homestead's taxable value growth at 10% a year. Here's how to file your homestead exemption in Flower Mound.

The Town is only 23 cents of your tax dollar

The mistake I see most often is treating the Town's rate as "the Flower Mound tax rate." It isn't. Your bill is a stack of separate taxing units, each with its own rate, its own exemptions, and its own adoption vote. For a home in the Lewisville ISD portion of Flower Mound in Denton County, the Town's own breakdown last year was 66% school district, 23% Town, 11% county.

Here's where each line stands as of mid-September 2026:

• Lewisville ISD: adopted $1.0778 per $100 for 2026-27, down from $1.1178, its lowest rate since 1999. Four "disaster pennies" added after the May 2024 storm expired, which is where the four-cent drop came from. The state's $140,000 school homestead exemption applies here. On the $640,000 median home, that four-cent cut is worth about $200 a year, more than twice what the Town's flat rate adds.
• Town of Flower Mound: proposed $0.387277, unchanged, with the 20% homestead exemption and a $150,000 exemption for homeowners 65 and older or with a qualifying disability.
• Denton County: last year's adopted rate was $0.185938. The county's 2026 no-new-revenue rate is $0.179909 and its voter-approval rate is $0.191201. Commissioners Court adopts its rate on its own schedule in September, and the county has cut its rate three years running. I broke down what the last cut did and didn't do in Denton County's 2026 tax rate cut and your Flower Mound bill.
• MUD or PID, if you're in one: a fourth line that exists in some newer communities and not in others. Furst Ranch is the obvious example, and the MUD taxes at Furst Ranch can add more than the Town line on their own.

Add the three main lines together and the composite for a Lewisville ISD home in Denton County goes from 1.691015 last year to about 1.651 this year before exemptions, assuming the county at least holds its rate. That is a real, if modest, decrease in the combined rate. It came almost entirely from the school district, and the school district's rate is set by a state formula, not by anyone you can email.

Five school districts serve Flower Mound, and part of the town sits in Tarrant County, so your specific stack may differ. Your closing disclosure and the Denton Central Appraisal District's property page will list every entity that taxes your address.

What to do with this if you're buying or selling

If you're buying, budget the carrying cost with the stack, not the headline. For a resale home in the Lewisville ISD part of town, roughly 1.65% of value before exemptions is the right starting point, then apply each exemption to its own line. On a $1.5M purchase that's about $24,800 a year before exemptions, and about $22,100 once the 20% Town exemption and the $140,000 school exemption are in. If the home is new construction, add the MUD or PID line and read how property taxes work your first year in a Flower Mound new build, because your first bill will be on an unimproved lot and your second will not.

Then plan for the Town line to grow about 3.5% a year, and pencil in a possible VATRE bump on top from 2028. A lender qualifies you on today's escrow. I'd rather you qualify yourself on the one you'll have in three years.

If you're selling, "low taxes" is a real Flower Mound selling point, and it's worth saying precisely. The Town rate is one of the lowest in Denton County, the homestead exemption is the maximum the state allows, and the school rate just hit a 27-year low. What you should not say is that taxes are going down, because a buyer's agent who pulls the no-new-revenue worksheet will show their client the Town is at its cap and headed for an election. Have your current bill and DCAD history ready and let the numbers speak.

And if you're doing both at once, selling here to buy here, the tax picture is one of the few costs that changes on both sides of the move at the same time. Your exemption doesn't transfer automatically, your new home's taxable value resets to what you paid, and if you're moving from an established neighborhood into a MUD district, your escrow can jump even as the Town's rate stays flat. That is exactly the kind of detail I run before a client writes an offer, not after the first escrow analysis lands.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is Flower Mound raising property taxes in 2026?

The Town is proposing to keep its rate at $0.387277 per $100, the same as 2025-26. Because that rate is above the certified no-new-revenue rate of $0.370440, it will collect about 4.5% more from existing properties than last year, which state law treats as a tax increase requiring a public hearing. The council's hearing and adoption vote is scheduled for September 21, 2026.

What is Flower Mound's no-new-revenue tax rate for 2026?

The certified 2026 no-new-revenue rate for the Town of Flower Mound is $0.370440 per $100 of taxable value, and the voter-approval rate is $0.388266. The proposed rate of $0.387277 sits between them, just under the ceiling that would trigger an election.

How much of my Flower Mound property tax goes to the Town?

For a home in Lewisville ISD and Denton County, the Town's share was about 23% of the total bill last year, with the school district at 66% and the county at 11%. On a $640,000 home with the 20% homestead exemption, the Town line at the proposed rate is about $1,983 a year.

Will Flower Mound hold a tax rate election?

The Town has said publicly that a voter-approval tax rate election is likely, because state law caps operating revenue growth at 3.5% a year and the Town is at that limit. Town staff told the Cross Timbers Gazette in July 2026 that voters would likely see it in 2027, with any change taking effect in the FY 2028 budget. Council makes the final call on whether and when.

Did Lewisville ISD lower its tax rate for 2026-27?

Yes. Lewisville ISD's board adopted a rate of $1.0778 per $100, down from $1.1178, which the district says is its lowest since 1999. The decrease came from four disaster-related pennies expiring rather than a local decision, since the state formula sets the district's maintenance-and-operations rate.

The bottom line

Flower Mound's flat rate collects more money than last year, sits at the edge of what the state allows, and comes with a plainly stated warning that an election is coming. Meanwhile your school district line just dropped four cents. Whether your total bill goes up or down next year depends on your appraised value, your exemptions, and which of the four or five entities on your bill moved. The only way to know your number is to run your number.

If you're thinking through a move like this, schedule a free Move-Up Strategy Call ... thirty minutes, no pitch, just a clear-headed look at where you are and what your best next move looks like.

This article is general information, not legal, tax, insurance, or lending advice. Rates shown are proposed or adopted figures as published by each taxing unit in September 2026 and change annually. Verify your specific numbers with your agent, your lender, your title company, the Denton Central Appraisal District, and where appropriate a licensed Texas attorney or CPA.

About Brian White

Brian White helps families in Northwest DFW make their move-up cleanly, selling and buying in one synchronized step. He built BlueFuse Group on a simple standard: other-first service, proactive at every turn, faith and excellence in equal measure. Brian has been married to Tisha for 27 years and is dad to three adult sons. When he's not protecting a family's equity or untangling a tight closing timeline, you'll find him chasing a round of golf or at Valley Creek Church.

Schedule a Move-Up Strategy Call ... no pitch, just a clear-headed look at your next move.