Below is the mechanism, with the source for every figure. Every rate on this page carries its tax year and its jurisdiction, because a Nashville tax rate without both is not a usable number.

The formula in three steps

Tennessee separates what a property is worth from the amount it is taxed on. The Comptroller of the Treasury sets out the arithmetic: appraised value multiplied by the assessment ratio equals assessed value, and assessed value multiplied by the tax rate equals the tax. Rates are stated per $100 of assessed value. The ratio depends on how the property is classified:

The Comptroller’s illustration: a residence appraised at $100,000 has an assessed value of $25,000. A reappraisal changes the appraised value, not the ratio.

Worked example 1: the Assessor’s $400,000 home

The Assessor of Property’s tax calculator uses a $400,000 residential appraisal in the Urban Services District at the combined rate of $2.814 for tax years 2025 and 2026:

1. Appraised value: $400,000.
2. Assessed value: $400,000 multiplied by 25 percent is $100,000.
3. Tax: $100,000 divided by 100 is 1,000, and 1,000 multiplied by $2.814 is $2,814.00 a year.

The Metro Trustee’s calculator runs the same arithmetic on a $100,000 home in the Urban Services District at $2.814 (tax years 2025 and 2026): $25,000 assessed, and 250 multiplied by $2.814 is $703.50.

What the 2025 reappraisal measured

Tennessee requires every county to revalue all real property on a set cycle, and the Comptroller describes the goal as assessments that reflect market value as of January 1 of the revaluation year. In Davidson County, 2025 was that year. The Assessor of Property describes the 2025 reappraisal as conducted over four years: three years of visual inspections of every parcel in the county, followed by revaluation of all property in the final year. New values were mailed on Friday, April 18, 2025, and the Assessor reported a final county-wide median value increase of 45 percent as of January 1, 2025. The prior reappraisal was in 2021.

That 45 percent is a median, so half of Davidson County properties moved less and half moved more, and it is the only reappraisal-wide figure the Assessor published. On timing, the Comptroller’s reappraisal schedule and the Assessor’s materials describe the length of Davidson County’s cycle differently, so this page gives no next reappraisal year. Confirm it with the Assessor’s office before relying on one.

The certified tax rate, and what state law requires

Metro’s FY2026 Operating Budget Book states the rule: local governments must lower the tax rate to a level which will produce the same amount of revenues from the new appraisals as was generated from the old rates and appraisals, except for new construction. That reset rate is called the certified tax rate. As the Assessor describes the cycle, in the revaluation year Metro Council must approve the certified tax rate based on the new values.

Three features of the certified rate are routinely misread:

• It is calculated on the whole base, not on your parcel. Even at the certified rate, a property whose value rose faster than the base as a whole pays more, and one that rose more slowly pays less.
• It excludes new construction. The neutral rate is calculated as if nothing new had been built.
• It is the reset step, not the final rate. Owners pay the rate Council adopts, and after the 2025 reappraisal those were two different numbers.

The correction: the adopted rate is $0.592 above the certified rate

The FY2026 budget letter describes $2.814 as lower than the prior combined rate of 3.254, the rate for tax year 2024. That is accurate about the rate and silent about any bill, because the rate fell while values rose, and a bill is the product of the two.

On the Assessor’s $400,000 example, which is $100,000 of assessed value, the gap between the certified rate and the adopted rate is $592 a year. For a parcel in the Urban Services District, the arithmetic runs in three steps:

1. The break-even point. A tax year 2025 bill is lower than the same property’s tax year 2024 bill only if the new value multiplied by 2.814 is less than the old value multiplied by 3.254. 3.254 divided by 2.814 is about 1.156, so the bill fell only where the value rose by less than about 16 percent.
2. The property at the median. For a 45 percent rise, 1.45 multiplied by 2.814, divided by 3.254, is about 1.25. The bill rose by roughly a quarter.
3. The certified rate, had it been adopted. 3.254 divided by 2.222 is about 1.46, a break-even of about 46 percent. The $0.592 is what moved the break-even from about 46 percent down to about 16 percent.

The county median is not the break-even point under the adopted rate. Any explanation that says a property rising by less than 45 percent received a lower bill is wrong.

General Services District versus Urban Services District

Metro levies its property tax in two layers. The General Services District rate is the county-wide levy. The Urban Services District rate is a second layer paid by parcels inside the USD. A parcel outside the USD pays the GSD rate alone, plus a satellite city’s own rate where one applies.

From tax year 2024 to tax year 2025 the USD layer fell from $0.332 to $0.032, while the GSD rate fell only from $2.922 to $2.782, so the two districts came out of the reappraisal in different places:

• USD parcel: break-even about 16 percent. At the 45 percent median, the bill rose about 25 percent.
• GSD-only parcel: break-even about 5 percent (2.922 divided by 2.782 is about 1.050). At the 45 percent median, the bill rose about 38 percent (1.45 multiplied by 2.782, divided by 2.922, is about 1.38).

So an owner outside the Urban Services District whose value rose by more than about 5 percent paid more in tax year 2025 than in tax year 2024. Metro published the certified rate only as a combined figure, so there is no certified GSD rate to compare against. Which district a parcel sits in is a parcel-level fact: confirm it on the property’s record with the Assessor or the Trustee, not from a neighborhood name.

The satellite cities inside Davidson County

Several cities inside Davidson County levy their own property tax. In the Comptroller’s 2025 rate table, the USD layer appears as the Nashville city rate, and Belle Meade, Goodlettsville and Ridgetop each appear with their own city rate beside the same $2.782 county (GSD) rate.

The Comptroller’s 2025 table has no municipal rate row for Oak Hill, Forest Hills or Berry Hill. That absence does not show whether any of the three levies a city property tax, so ask each city before estimating a bill there.

Worked example 2: the City of Belle Meade’s own 2025 bill instructions

1. Appraised value: $3,000,000. Assessed at 25 percent: $750,000.
2. City of Belle Meade: $750,000 divided by 100 is 7,500, and 7,500 multiplied by $0.3011 is $2,258.25.
3. Metro GSD: 7,500 multiplied by $2.782 is $20,865.00.
4. Adding the two lines: $23,123.25 for tax year 2025. The city’s instructions show each line separately.

Belle Meade’s city rate was $0.50 per $100 for tax year 2024 and reset to $0.3011 for tax year 2025; the city’s FY2026-2027 adopted budget books its property tax revenue at the same .3011. The tax year 2024 total was $3.422 ($2.922 plus $0.50) against $3.0831 for tax year 2025, and 3.422 divided by 3.0831 is about 1.11, so a Belle Meade bill fell only where the value rose by less than about 11 percent.

Worked example 3: one house, different value changes

This is illustrative arithmetic, not a real property. Take a residential parcel in the Urban Services District with a $300,000 appraised value on its tax year 2024 bill. Its $75,000 assessment at the tax year 2024 rate of $3.254 produced a bill of $2,440.50. Here is its tax year 2025 bill at $2.814 under different reappraisal outcomes.

Now move the same illustrative house outside the Urban Services District. At the tax year 2024 GSD rate of $2.922, the $75,000 assessment produced $2,191.50. After a 45 percent rise, the $108,750 assessment at the tax year 2025 GSD rate of $2.782 produces $3,025.43, which is $833.93 or about 38 percent higher. Tax year 2026 carries the same rates, so each tax year 2026 bill matches tax year 2025 unless the appraised value changed.

When the bill is due

The Metro Trustee mails statements in October. Davidson County taxes are due and payable on the first Monday of October and must be paid in full by the last day of February of the following year to avoid interest. From March 1, the Trustee adds interest of 1.5 percent on the first day of each month, 18 percent a year. February is the interest deadline, not the due date.

How to appeal your appraised value

You appeal the value, not the rate. Council sets the rate for everyone in the district. What an individual owner can challenge is the appraisal, classification or assessment of their own parcel, at three levels:

1. An Informal Review Request with the Assessor of Property.
2. The Metropolitan Board of Equalization, an independent board and, in the Assessor’s words, the first level of administrative appeal for complaints regarding property assessment, classification and valuation.
3. The State Board of Equalization, where appeals must be filed within 45 days of the Metropolitan Board’s mailing date.

For 2026, informal review decisions were mailed May 20, 2026, and Metropolitan Board hearings were set for August 24 and 26, 2026. Appeals are available every year, not only in reappraisal years. The 2026 informal review and Metropolitan Board scheduling windows have closed. A State Board of Equalization appeal must be filed within 45 days of the Metropolitan Board’s mailing date, so an owner who had a 2026 hearing should work from the date on that decision notice. The Assessor posts each year’s calendar at padctn.org. A representative who is not a family member needs a Letter of Authorization naming the map and parcel and the assessment year.

Tax relief, the tax freeze and tax deferral

The Trustee describes the relief and freeze programs as state and Metropolitan government-funded initiatives delivered as credits.

For the 2026 Davidson County relief and freeze programs, the application must be filed and the taxes paid in full by April 5, 2027, and the Trustee accepts freeze applications from October through April 5. Disabled veterans and widows or widowers of disabled veterans apply on separate terms, with relief calculated on up to $175,000 of market value for 2026. Confirm the income terms for the current program with the Trustee. The freeze, under the Property Tax Freeze Act effective July 1, 2007, answers a reappraisal directly because it holds the tax amount, not the value or the rate.

Tennessee’s homestead exemption is not a property tax program

Tennessee’s homestead exemption, Tenn. Code Ann. 26-2-301, protects part of a principal residence from execution, attachment or sale by creditors. It is not a property tax exemption. The statute states that it does not operate against public taxes, and it does not reduce a Davidson County tax bill.

What the reappraisal does and does not mean for a list price

An appraised value is the Assessor’s estimate of market value as of January 1, 2025. It is a useful data point, not a list price:

• It has a date on it. A buyer in the fall of 2026 pays what the competing inventory in your price band supports now.
• It is relative. A value that rose well above the 45 percent median means the Assessor concluded your property gained ground on the county as a whole. It is not a comparable sale.
• It does not fix the next owner’s bill. The bill depends on the value on record and on the rate Council adopts for each tax year.

What the reappraisal does change is the tax line a buyer underwrites, and two similar homes may sit in different districts. A well-prepared listing states the current appraised value, the district and the rate with its tax year, so the buyer does not have to reconstruct it from a stale figure.

For the rest of the pricing decision, including inventory, closing costs and disclosure, see the complete 2026 guide to selling a home in Nashville, and the sellers page explains how the team approaches a listing. Condominium owners weighing the tax line alongside association dues will find the rest in the guide to downtown Nashville condos and high-rises. If your property’s value sits mainly in the lot, what matters is what the district allows to be built, which the explainer on HPRs and tall and skinny homes covers at district level. Zoning and regime eligibility vary lot by lot, so verify a specific parcel through the Nashville Parcel Viewer.

Frequently asked questions