Why did my property tax bill go up in Herriman?

Your Herriman property tax bill went up for one of four reasons, and the two notices the county sends you each year tell you which. Either the Salt Lake County Assessor raised your home’s market value as of January 1, one or more of the entities that tax your parcel raised its rate through a Truth in Taxation hearing, your primary residential exemption came off, or your house was new construction that was only partly assessed the year before.

Herriman homeowners ask me this more than anywhere else I work, as a Realtor with Keller Williams South Valley, because Herriman has all four causes at once: rising values, a young city with growing budgets, thousands of recent buyers, and a lot of new construction. Here is how to read your bill and tell which one hit you. The calendar matters as much as the cause, and when Salt Lake County property taxes are due sets out the dates, including the appeal window that closes before the bill arrives.

The four causes, side by side

Cause	Where you see it	Can you appeal it?	What to do
Market value went up	Valuation notice, mailed by late July	Yes — to the County Board of Equalization by September 15 or 45 days after the notice	Compare to actual sales near you; appeal if it is high
A taxing entity raised its rate	Tax notice in the fall; the entity held a public hearing in August	No — rates are set at the hearing	Attend the hearing next year; the notice lists which entity
Primary residential exemption removed	Taxable value equals full market value instead of 55% of it	Not an appeal — a reapplication	File the residential declaration with the Salt Lake County Assessor
New construction, partly assessed last year	Last year’s value was land plus a partial house; this year’s is the whole house	Only if the value itself is wrong	Expect it; budget on the full value from the start

Dates and process from the Utah State Tax Commission property tax calendar and Salt Lake County Assessor and Treasurer dates and deadlines, checked September 13, 2026.

Cause one: the county raised your value

Every year the assessor sets a market value for your home as of January 1, the lien date, and mails a valuation notice by late July. If Herriman sales rose, your value rose with them, and your share of the tax burden rose with it. Utah home prices have kept rising mostly because of supply, and Herriman has been on the rising side of that for years.

This is the one cause you can do something about. You may appeal the market value — not the rate — to the Salt Lake County Board of Equalization by September 15, or 45 days after the notice was mailed, whichever is later (Utah State Tax Commission; Salt Lake County Assessor). The evidence that works is actual sales of comparable homes near you, or an appraisal, or a recent purchase price if you just bought. “It went up a lot” is not evidence. “Three houses on my street sold for less” is. The full appeal process, with what wins and when not to bother, is here.

Cause two: a taxing entity raised its rate

Your bill is not one tax. It is a stack of rates from every entity that serves your parcel — Salt Lake County, Herriman City, the school district, and the special districts for things like water, sewer, mosquito abatement and libraries. Each sets its own rate.

Utah’s Truth in Taxation law limits an entity to collecting the same total revenue as the prior year unless it holds a public hearing and votes to collect more (Utah State Tax Commission). Those hearings happen in August. When an entity does that, your bill rises even if your value did not move, and the tax notice in the fall shows the increase by entity.

This one cannot be appealed; it can only be argued at the hearing, which most people learn about after it has happened. The practical move is to read the notice, find the entity whose line grew, and put next August’s hearing on your calendar if you care. In a young, growing city, this cause comes up more often than in a settled one.

Cause three: your exemption came off

A primary residence in Utah is taxed on 55 percent of its market value because of the 45 percent residential exemption (Utah Code 59-2-103). If that exemption is removed, your taxable value jumps to 100 percent, and the bill rises far more than any value change or rate hearing could produce. A protection with a confusingly similar name is Utah’s homestead exemption, which shields equity from creditors rather than reducing your bill.

Salt Lake County sends new owners a residential declaration, and per Utah law the county removes the exemption if the declaration is not completed within 30 days of the mailing; once removed, you must reapply with evidence such as a driver’s license or voter registration (Salt Lake County Assessor). A new home may default to non-residential in the county’s system until an application is filed. If your taxable value on the notice equals the full market value, this is what happened. It is fixable — file with the assessor — and it is the most common cause I see among people who bought in the last two years. The exemption works the same way statewide — I explained it in the Washington County post.

Cause four: your house was new

Property is assessed as of January 1 at whatever stood on the lot that day, and construction in progress is valued at its stage of completion (Utah State Tax Commission). If your Herriman house was framed but not finished last January 1, last year’s bill reflected land plus a partial structure. This January it was a finished house, and the bill reflects that.

Nothing went wrong. The first-year bill was low because the house did not fully exist yet. The problem is that a lot of buyers set their budget — and their lender set their escrow — on that first bill. New construction in Herriman comes with a list of things the model home does not mention, and this is one of them. Budget on the full value from day one, and tell your lender to escrow on it.

How to read your two notices

The valuation notice (late July) shows the market value, the taxable value, and an estimate of the tax at the proposed rates. If market value rose, that is cause one. If taxable value equals market value, that is cause three. If last year’s value was a fraction of this year’s on a new house, that is cause four. The notice also lists any entity proposing a rate increase and its hearing date — that is cause two, in advance.

The tax notice (fall) shows the final amount by entity, due November 30 (Salt Lake County Treasurer). Compare it line by line to last year’s. The line that grew tells you the entity.

What I tell Herriman owners

Appeal a value that is genuinely above what your neighbors’ homes sold for, and do it before September 15. Check the taxable value every year to make sure the exemption is still on. Expect the second-year jump on a new house and budget for it in year one. And accept that in a city adding residents, roads, parks and schools as fast as Herriman is, some of the increase is the cost of the growth that made the city worth buying into. That growth is the reason people move here, and the tax bill is where it shows up.

If you want the baseline rather than the reason for a change, what property taxes are actually like in Herriman covers the structure.

If you are deciding whether to sell and the bill is part of the reason, whether to sell your Herriman house now or wait depends on where you are going, not on the tax. And if you want a current read on what your home is worth against the county’s number, the home value page is where to start.

— Kelsey Earl, Realtor, Keller Williams South Valley

Note: General information, not tax or legal advice. Tax rules, rates and deadlines change and vary by county — confirm anything here with the county assessor or treasurer and with your own CPA before you act on it.