How Ad Valorem Taxes Work in Mississippi

Mississippi property tax is an ad valorem tax — Latin for "according to value." Every parcel in the state is taxed unless the law exempts it, and the amount depends on two numbers: what the property is worth and what rate the local governments have set.

That sounds simple. What confuses people is everything around it: five classes of property with different ratios, a homestead exemption you have to apply for, and a half-dozen different officials who each control one piece of the process.

Here's how it actually works.

Who does what

No single office runs the property tax system. Five different actors each hold a piece of it:

• The tax assessor (county, elected) locates, classifies, and values every parcel and every item of taxable business personal property, and prepares the assessment rolls. Real property must be reappraised at least once every four years; taxable personal property is revalued annually.
• The board of supervisors reviews the assessor's values, hears taxpayer objections, formally adopts the rolls, and — wearing its other hat — levies the county's taxes.
• The chancery clerk keeps the land records the assessor works from, assists the board with the rolls and with appeals, and administers the annual tax sale.
• The tax collector (county, elected; sometimes the same person as the assessor) sends the bills and collects the money.
• The Department of Revenue provides appraisal guidance, audits county appraisal work for uniformity, and reviews the rolls the counties send up.

The taxing authorities — county boards of supervisors, municipal boards of aldermen or councils, and certain school boards — are the ones who actually set rates.

The formula

The calculation is the same for every class of property:

True value × assessment ratio = assessed value

assessed value × millage rate = tax

Or, in one line using mills and exemptions:

Tax = (True Value × Ratio) × (Mills ÷ 1,000)

True value is not market value

"True value" is defined in Miss. Code Ann. § 27-35-50. It includes market value, but it isn't simply market value. Class I and Class II property is appraised according to current use, regardless of location, and agricultural land is appraised according to its use on January 1 using soil types, productivity, and similar criteria.

The practical result: a hundred acres of farmland at the edge of a growing town may carry a true value far below what a developer would pay for it. Agricultural and forestland values are set using DOR criteria rather than comparable sales.

The five classes and their ratios

The assessment ratios are set by the Mississippi Constitution — the county cannot change them.

A property must meet the Class I definition exactly — single-family, owner-occupied, residential. Everything else is Class II: rental houses, farms, timberland, commercial buildings, and most vacant land. A single parcel can be part Class I and part Class II, which is common where someone lives on a working farm.

What a mill is

A mill is one-thousandth of a dollar — $0.001. At 100 mills you pay $100 for every $1,000 of assessed value.

Your property is almost always subject to more than one millage rate. Every parcel pays a county rate and a school district rate. Inside a city, you also pay the municipal rate. Inside a levee district or other special district, you pay that too. The rates are added together.

Taxing authorities set their millage in September for the fiscal year beginning October 1, with the levy adopted on or before September 15. There is a general 10 percent cap on the increase in total receipts from levies compared with any one of the three preceding fiscal years, with excess collections escrowed to reduce the next year's taxes. Debt service, the library levy, and revenue from newly constructed or newly added property are excluded from the cap.

Worked examples

Take a house with a true value of $200,000, in a city where the county levies 40 mills, the school district 50 mills, and the city 20 mills — 110 mills total.

As an owner-occupied home (Class I)

The same house as a rental (Class II)

Same house, same millage, $1,400 difference — because of the class ratio and the exemption. This is why the assessor cares whether you actually live there, and why moving out of a house you keep as a rental changes your tax bill.

The same house, owner over 65

The homestead exemption

Mississippi's ad valorem homestead exemption is in Title 27, Chapter 33 of the Code. It applies only to Class I property.

This is the one exemption you have to ask for. File an application with the county tax assessor between January 1 and April 1. Miss. Code Ann. § 27-33-31. You do not reapply every year, but you must reapply if anything changes — marriage, divorce, death, a change in ownership or in how the property is used.

To be safe, if you file a new deed, even a correction deed that does not change title, contact the tax assessor about refiling for homestead exemption. It has been the practice of many counties to apply a 15% assessment rate to owner occupied, residential real property if homestead is not properly filed. So the tax bill can increase dramatically if the homestead exemption is lost.

Two versions

Regular exemption (under 65, not totally disabled). A credit against the tax, on a sliding scale keyed to assessed value, capped at $300. Miss. Code Ann. § 27-33-7. Half the credit comes off the school levy and half off the county general fund — it does not reduce the municipal portion of your bill. Because the scale tops out at $7,500 of assessed value, almost every home worth $75,000 or more receives the same $300.

Special exemption (65 or older, or totally disabled). Not a credit but a true exemption: the first $75,000 of true value — that is, $7,500 of assessed value — is exempt from all ad valorem taxes, county, school, and municipal. A home with a true value of $75,000 or less pays no property tax at all. Proof of disability is required (VA determination, Social Security records, physician letters, and similar documentation).

Disabled veterans. Since 2015, service-connected totally disabled veterans honorably discharged, and their unmarried surviving spouses, are exempt from all ad valorem taxes on the assessed value of homestead property.

Limits and conditions worth knowing

• 160 acres. The land included in the exemption cannot exceed 160 eligible acres. Miss. Code Ann. § 27-33-23. The exemption is also capped at $7,500 of assessed value.
• Ownership timing. You must own and occupy the property as your primary residence on January 1. Under DOR regulations, the acknowledgment date of the instrument by which you took title must be no later than January 1, and the instrument must be filed for record with the chancery clerk on or before January 7 of the year you're claiming. Miss. Admin. Code 35-VI-3.05. Close in late December and record in mid-January, and you have lost the exemption for that entire year.
• Income tax compliance. You are ineligible if you or your spouse failed to comply with Mississippi income tax law — including filing as a non-resident.
• Car tags. Your vehicles must be tagged where they're domiciled, which for exemption purposes is the homestead property.
• Married couples. If a service member is stationed out of state but claims Mississippi residency, both spouses must qualify.

Three different things called "homestead"

Do not confuse this with the other two Mississippi homestead doctrines:

• The creditor exemption (Miss. Code Ann. § 85-3-21) protects up to 160 acres and $75,000 in value from seizure and sale. Automatic; no application.
• The spousal joinder requirement (Miss. Code Ann. § 89-1-29) voids a deed or deed of trust on homestead property that the non-titled spouse didn't sign. Automatic; no application.

Only the tax exemption requires a filing. Never applying for it does not affect the other two — and having it does not prove much about them, though the tax roll is evidence a title examiner will look at.

The annual cycle: how the land roll gets made

The whole system runs on a calendar. Here is the year, with the statutes that set each step:

The roll the board finally approves is the legal roll, and the values on it are the legal values for paying taxes. That is why the objection window in July and August matters so much: once the roll is approved and the appeal period runs, the number is the number.

How ownership gets onto the roll

The assessor builds the roll from the land records. The chancery clerk records deeds, wills, decrees, and other instruments; the assessor's office reads them, updates the ownership maps, and carries the change into the next roll. Larger counties do this with a mapping and CAMA system; the process is the same either way.

Splits and combinations work the same way. If you buy 40 acres out of a 160-acre parcel, the assessor has to create a new parcel, assign it a number, and pick up the remainder as a separate tract. That happens on the assessor's schedule, not yours.

Why your closing doesn't change this year's tax bill

This is the single most common source of confusion, and it has a statutory answer.

The lien attaches on January 1. Miss. Code Ann. § 27-35-1 provides that the tax lien attaches to all land in the state on January 1 of each year, and that it takes preference over all judgments, executions, encumbrances, and liens whenever created. Miss. Code Ann. § 27-35-3 fixes January 1 as the date establishing liability to taxation. The Department of Revenue puts it plainly: property is assessed each year to the owner of record on January 1.

The roll is built around that date. The assessor's rolls go to the board in July describing the county as it stood on January 1. A deed recorded in June describes a transaction the roll for that year has already passed by. Your name goes on next year's roll.

And the statute says the owner's name doesn't matter anyway. Section 27-35-1 is explicit: it is not necessary to the validity of an assessment, or of a sale of land for taxes, that the land be assessed to its true owner. The taxes are a charge upon the land, and a tax sale is a proceeding against the thing sold, vesting title in the purchaser without regard to who owned the property when it was assessed or when it was sold.

So four things follow, and every one of them bites somebody every year:

1. The bill may go to the seller. It may go to the seller's old address. It may go to a lender that no longer services the loan. If nobody forwards it, nobody pays it — and the county is under no obligation to find you.
2. Nonpayment is your problem regardless. The lien is on the land. An unpaid bill in the seller's name still ends with your property at the tax sale.
3. Prorate at closing, and then verify. Proration is a contract between buyer and seller. The county is not a party to it and will not honor it. Whoever holds title when the bill comes due needs to make sure it gets paid.
4. Split parcels are the worst case. If you bought a piece of a larger tract, the whole tract may still be assessed as one parcel for the current year. Paying "your" share may not stop a sale of the whole tract. Find out how the parcel is actually carried on the roll before February 1.

There is a related trap in the tax sale statutes: each separate assessment as it appears on the assessment roll constitutes one tract for purposes of a sale for taxes. Miss. Code Ann. § 27-41-59. The roll, not your deed, defines what gets sold.

Practical checklist after any Mississippi closing:

• Call the tax collector's office and confirm what parcel number covers your land and what is owed for the current year.
• Give the tax collector and the assessor your mailing address in writing.
• If you're claiming homestead exemption, confirm your deed was recorded by January 7 and file between January 1 and April 1.
• If you bought part of a tract, ask the assessor when the split will be reflected and how the current-year bill is being handled.
• Do not assume an escrowed loan handles it correctly in the first year. Check.

Disagreeing with your assessment

The rolls are open for inspection in July, and objections go to the board of supervisors — normally filed by the first Monday in August preceding the due date of the taxes. Miss. Code Ann. § 27-35-89. Objections must be in writing. If you don't object, the assessment stands. § 27-35-93.

From the board's decision there is a statutory appeal route, and further review runs through the Board of Tax Appeals and the courts. §§ 27-35-119, 27-35-163.

Use the statutory process, because the tort route is closed. Under the Mississippi Tort Claims Act, a governmental entity is immune from any claim "arising out of the assessment or collection of any tax or fee." Miss. Code Ann. § 11-46-9(1)(i). You cannot sue the county for a bad valuation.

That immunity has a limit worth knowing. In Booneville Collision Repair, Inc. v. City of Booneville, 152 So. 3d 265 (Miss. 2014), the Supreme Court held that a tax collector's statutory duty to file the tax-sale list with the chancery clerk is ministerial — there is no element of choice or judgment — and that the failure to file it does not arise out of the assessment or collection of a tax, because the purpose of the filing is to give notice. No immunity there.

Tax sales, briefly

If taxes go unpaid past February 1, the land can be sold. The tax collector advertises after August 5 and sells at the courthouse — some counties on the first Monday in April, others on the last Monday in August, and some now online with board approval. Miss. Code Ann. §§ 27-41-55, 27-41-59.

The owner has a constitutional right to redeem. Article 4, Section 79 of the Mississippi Constitution requires a redemption period of not less than two years for owners and persons interested in the property, and that right is self-executing — the Legislature can set reasonable conditions but cannot take it away. The mechanics are in Title 27, Chapter 45; the notice requirements the clerk must satisfy before the redemption period closes are in Chapter 43.

If nobody buys a parcel at the sale, it is struck off to the State of Mississippi and administered by the Secretary of State's office (1-866-835-2637).

Buying at a tax sale is a very different proposition from what the "perfect title" language on a tax deed suggests. See our separate article on tax titles for why title insurers treat them the way they do and what it takes to make one marketable.

Resources

• Understanding Mississippi Property Taxes — MSU Extension Publication 2833. The clearest plain-English overview available, with the full regular-exemption credit table.
• Local Property Appraisal — Mississippi Department of Revenue. Who does what, millage, appeals, and payment.
• Property Tax Frequently Asked Questions — Mississippi Department of Revenue.
• Mississippi Code, Title 27 — Taxation and Finance. The chapters that matter here: 33 (homestead exemptions), 35 (assessment), 39 (levy), 41 (collection and tax sales), 43 (notice to redeem), 45 (redemption).
• Your county tax assessor and tax collector. Most counties now publish a parcel viewer, current millage rates, and homestead forms online. This is the fastest way to answer a question about a specific parcel.

Buying land in Mississippi and not sure how the taxes are carried on the roll, whether a split has been made, or whether an old tax sale is lurking in the chain? Maples Richey looks at these records every day — ask us before closing rather than after.

This article is general information about Mississippi law, not legal advice. Millage rates, exemption amounts, and county practices change. For a specific parcel, contact your county tax assessor or collector — or contact us.

Title image: Sanborn Map Company, Wesson, Copiah County, Mississippi (1910), index map, detail. Library of Congress, Geography and Map Division.