Am I crazy? My friend owns a house in Sacramento. We (I'm in Texas) compared notes, and our property tax rates are comparable.

I believe property taxes in Texas can be reevaluated when the value changes while you own the home. In California it is only upon sale.

Oh that makes sense, thank you. In Texas they drive around and reassess your house in the springtime. Which is why all of the improvements to my house will be on the backside! Meanwhile the both of us are very recent homeowners, so the reassessment hasn't happened yet.

I do have a friend that has 100% service-connected disability... And Texas has a 0% property tax for veterans with that categorization. He's thinking about moving

Anecdata: I lived in the bay area and moved to Austin, TX. My tax rate went from ~1.5% to ~2.2%

You clearly haven't been to Austin... there's nothing sane about property values here.

It's also the fasting growing city in the nation, and I think it'd be worse if we didn't have a ~3% property tax.

But probably better if they didn't have zoning.

Austin is utopia of sanity compared to Toronto where I live.