Dallasculture & etiquette

The Metroplex spans Dallas, Tarrant, Collin, Denton, Rockwall and Ellis counties, and dozens of independent cities and school districts overlay them. Your property tax rate is the sum of county, city, school district, community college and hospital district levies, and it varies materially between two houses a mile apart. Combined effective rates in the area typically land around 2.2–2.5% of assessed value. Look up the specific address on the county appraisal district site before you commit — 'Dallas' on a listing may mean Plano ISD, Richardson ISD or Highland Park ISD, and they are not the same.

Texas levies no personal income tax at all, which is the headline reason people move here from California and New York. Property tax replaces it. If you rent, it reaches you through the rent; if you buy, it arrives as a five-figure annual bill. The school-district homestead exemption rose to $140,000 after voters approved it in November 2025, and there is a 10% annual cap on how fast a homestead's taxable value can rise — but only if you file for the exemption, which is free and which newcomers routinely forget for years.

That is the most generous window of any big state in this app — California gives ten days. Better still, Texas has reciprocity with France, Germany, South Korea, the UAE and Taiwan: a valid unexpired licence from one of those means no knowledge test and no skills test at all. Book the DPS appointment on arrival anyway, because Metroplex offices run weeks out.

Because the state declined the ACA Medicaid expansion, there is a band of income too high for Texas Medicaid — which for working-age adults without children is close to nonexistent — and too low for marketplace subsidies. Texas uses the federal HealthCare.gov rather than running its own exchange. If a Dallas job offer does not include health insurance, price the alternative before you accept it. Dallas County residents do have Parkland Health, the county hospital district, as a genuine safety net.

The North Texas Tollway Authority runs the Dallas North Tollway, the President George Bush Turnpike and the Sam Rayburn, and TxDOT runs dynamically priced TEXpress managed lanes on top. There are no toll booths. Without a transponder your plate is photographed and you are billed by post at a significantly higher ZipCash rate, with administrative fees stacking on unpaid invoices. Out-of-state plates and rental cars are where this bites hardest.

North Texas sits in one of the most damaging hail corridors in the world, and spring storms regularly write off car roofs and roofs of houses across whole suburbs in a single evening. Comprehensive auto cover and a covered parking space are not luxuries here. Check the roof age and the deductible structure on any home insurance quote — many Texas policies now carry a separate, percentage-based wind and hail deductible rather than a flat one.