Yolo Property Tax: Rates, Deadlines & Appeals (2026)

The 2026 regular-roll appeal deadline in Yolo County is Monday, November 30, 2026. File an Assessment Appeal Application (BOE-305-AH) with the Yolo County Assessment Appeals Board / Clerk of the Board, online through the county assessment-appeals page or by mail/in person at 625 Court Street, Room 204, Woodland, CA 95695; the county lists a $45 nonrefundable fee per application/parcel.

How assessments work in Yolo County

Yolo County’s 2026-27 assessment roll is based on property values as of January 1, 2026. The Assessor/Clerk-Recorder/Registrar of Voters announced a 2026 roll of $41.2 billion, up 3.98% from the prior year, and said assessed values would be available online in late August, tax bills mailed in mid-September, and the assessment appeal filing window would run July 2 through November 30.

For most homeowners, California’s Proposition 13 sets a “base year” value when you buy or complete new construction, then generally limits annual increases to no more than 2% until another reassessable event occurs. Yolo’s Assessor explains the regular taxable value is the lower of the factored Prop. 13 base-year value or current market value under Prop. 8 decline-in-value rules.

That means a recent buyer in Davis, Woodland, West Sacramento, Winters, or unincorporated Yolo may see a reassessment closer to the purchase price, plus supplemental tax bills. A long-time owner usually should not appeal just because market prices are high; the key question is whether the county’s taxable value is above what the property would have sold for on January 1, 2026.

Property taxes are not set by the Assessor. Yolo County says the general levy is limited to 1% of assessed value, with voter-approved special taxes, city assessments, and district direct assessments added depending on the parcel’s Tax Rate Area (TRA). Use your own bill or the county’s “Tax Rates by TRA” publication for your exact rate before estimating savings.

Whether you should appeal

Start with the Assessor’s informal process if your issue is residential market value. For 2026, the county form is Request for Informal Assessor Review (Proposition 8) (YC-LD2026), and the Assessor’s forms page says it must be filed or postmarked by December 31, 2026. The informal form can be mailed to Yolo County Assessor, Attn: Prop 8 Review, 625 Court Street #104, Woodland, CA 95695-3490, emailed to assessor@yolocounty.gov, or faxed to 530-666-8213.

Do not confuse the informal review with a formal appeal. Yolo’s own Prop. 8 form warns that if you are not notified of the result by November 15 or you disagree with the Assessor’s result, you should consider filing the formal Application for Changed Assessment by the appeal deadline. Because today is in 2026 and the formal deadline is November 30, you can still file the formal appeal to protect your rights even if the informal review is pending.

A good Yolo County appeal normally needs evidence tied to January 1, 2026. The county’s informal form asks for your opinion of market value, your 2026-27 assessed value, building square footage, and comparable sales; it says sales before March 31 may be used. Focus on comparable homes in the same city or neighborhood, similar size, age, condition, lot, and school/utility district.

Yolo County does not appear to publish homeowner appeal success rates, median reductions, or average savings. Do not pay a consultant based on a “guaranteed” reduction unless the claimed savings are supported by your specific comparable sales and your current assessed value.

Step-by-step how to file

1. Look up your value and tax bill. Use Yolo’s online property tax/assessment tools or your mailed bill. You will need the parcel or assessment number, property address, and the value you are challenging.

2. Decide what you are appealing. For a normal 2026 decline-in-value case, check the regular assessment / decline in value reason on Assessment Appeal Application BOE-305-AH. For supplemental, escape, roll-change, or calamity assessment notices, the county says the appeal is due within 60 days after the date of the notice, unless the last day falls on a weekend.

3. Get the official form. Use Yolo County’s Assessment Appeal Application (BOE-305-AH). If someone else signs or represents you, use the county’s Agent Authorization form. If you cannot afford the fee, the assessment-appeals page says a confidential Request for Waiver of Assessment Appeal Administrative Process Fee may be submitted with the application instead of payment.

4. File with the Clerk of the Board, not the Assessor. Online filing is available from the Yolo County Assessment Appeals page. Online filers must pay by credit card or bank draft, and the county lists a $2 service fee for either payment option. The page also says documents can be attached electronically through the application’s paperclip feature; if upload problems occur or you have multiple documents, email them to clerkoftheboard@yolocounty.gov.

5. Mail or hand-deliver if you prefer paper. File at Yolo County Assessment Appeals Board, Clerk of the Board, 625 Court Street, Room 204, Woodland, CA 95695. Make checks or money orders payable to County of Yolo. The county says cash is accepted in person, and applications submitted without the $45 fee will not be processed unless a fee-waiver request accompanies the application.

6. Keep paying taxes. Yolo explicitly warns that filing an appeal or informal review does not stop penalties or interest. The first secured installment is delinquent after December 10 and the second after April 10; if the value is reduced later, the overpayment is refunded.

What happens after

The proper appeal authority is the Yolo County Assessment Appeals Board, a citizen board appointed by the Yolo County Board of Supervisors to equalize property assessments. Yolo’s FAQ describes it as a three-member panel and says hearings are informal but similar to a courtroom hearing: you and the Assessor present factual evidence, testimony is under oath, and hearings are recorded.

Yolo says most appeals are scheduled within 3 to 9 months, but state law allows up to 2 years for the board to hear and decide an Application for Changed Assessment. You should receive hearing notice at least 45 days before the hearing.

At the hearing, bring a short packet: your requested value, your comparable sales grid, photos showing condition issues, closing statements or appraisals if relevant, and a copy of the value notice or tax bill. The Board may lower, leave unchanged, or increase the assessment based on the evidence. The Board may announce its decision at the hearing or mail it, usually within 4 to 5 weeks. Yolo’s public FAQ does not advertise a separate non-oral residential option; if you cannot attend, ask the Clerk about postponement rules before the 21-day mark.

Local tips

Check exemptions before appealing. Yolo County’s homeowner exemption reduces assessed value by $7,000, saving at least about $70 per year under the 1% general levy. File with the Assessor between January 1 and February 15 for the full exemption, or within 30 days of a supplemental assessment notice; late filing through December 10 gives 80% of the exemption. Totally disabled veterans and qualifying unmarried surviving spouses should also check the Disabled Veterans’ Exemption (BOE-261-G), which can be far more valuable than the homeowner exemption.

Work a realistic savings example. Suppose a Woodland homeowner’s 2026-27 taxable value is $640,000, but good January 1 evidence supports $600,000. The reduction is $40,000. Using Yolo’s 1% general levy, the basic annual tax savings is about $400 before any voter-approved debt-rate effects; if your actual TRA rate is about 1.09%, the estimate becomes about $436. Subtract the $45 filing fee, and the first-year net savings is roughly $355 to $391, plus possible future benefit if the lower Prop. 8 value remains below your factored base-year value.

Do not appeal the tax rate or direct charges. The Assessment Appeals Board changes value, not Mello-Roos, parcel taxes, city charges, school bonds, or where tax money goes. If the complaint is a line item on the bill, call the Tax Collector or the agency listed for that charge.

Calendar both deadlines. For 2026 residential decline-in-value cases, the informal Assessor review deadline is December 31, 2026, but the formal appeal deadline is November 30, 2026. If you wait for the informal review and miss November 30, you may lose the formal hearing right for the 2026 regular roll.

Yolo County Property Tax Rate

General levy is limited to 1% of assessed value; total bills are not a single countywide millage because voter-approved special taxes, city assessments, district direct assessments, and Tax Rate Area (TRA) rates can also apply.

Source: https://www.yolocounty.gov/government/general-government-departments/financial-services/property-tax

When Are Property Taxes Due in Yolo County?

Secured property taxes are payable in two installments: 1st installment due November 1 and delinquent after 5:00 PM on December 10; 2nd installment due February 1 and delinquent after 5:00 PM on April 10. For the 2026-27 tax year, April 10, 2027 falls on a Saturday, so the county’s weekend/holiday rule allows payment by the next business day without late penalty. Secured tax bills are payable in two installments. Current monthly payments are not accepted directly by the Tax Collector, but Yolo County lists Easy Smart Pay as a monthly-payment option through its partner; the Tax Collector may also allow a five-year payment plan on certain secured delinquent taxes.

This is not the same as the assessment appeal deadline above. The appeal deadline is your window to contest your assessed value; the payment due date is when the resulting tax bill must be paid. Missing one does not affect the other, but missing either has real consequences — one forfeits your right to appeal for the year, the other can trigger penalties and interest.

Source: https://www.yolocounty.gov/government/general-government-departments/financial-services/property-tax

Property Tax Exemptions in Yolo County

• Homeowners' Exemption — Owner-occupants of a California residence that is owned and occupied as the owner’s principal place of residence as of 12:01 AM on January 1, or qualifying supplemental-assessment situations after a change in ownership/new construction.. Reduces assessed value by $7,000 and reduces the tax bill by at least $70. Yes, initial application; automatically continues each year while the owner continues to own and occupy the property as the primary residence. Apply by File by February 15 for the full exemption; Yolo County also accepts late filing from February 16 through December 10 for 80% of the exemption, and supplemental-assessment claims may be filed within 30 days of the Notice of Supplemental Assessment.. (Source: https://yolorecorder.org/163/Exclusions-Exemptions)
• Disabled Veterans' Exemption — A veteran rated 100% disabled, blind, or paraplegic due to a service-connected disability, or the unmarried surviving spouse of such a veteran, for an owner-occupied home/principal residence.. For the 2026 lien date: up to $180,671 basic exemption, or up to $271,009 low-income exemption if household income is within the 2026 limit of $81,131; the amounts are not combined. Yes. Basic exemption requires an initial filing and then continues while eligible; low-income exemption requires annual filing. Apply by Yolo County states qualified applicants must file by the end of the calendar year for the tax year sought; for annual low-income claims, file by February 15 for 100% of the eligible exemption, with reduced late relief after that date under state rules.. (Source: https://www.boe.ca.gov/proptaxes/pdf/sample-boe261g.pdf)
• Veterans' Exemption — Honorably discharged qualifying veterans, a qualifying unmarried surviving spouse, or pensioned parent of a deceased qualifying veteran, subject to very low property-ownership limits; Yolo County notes most homeowners will not qualify because of these limits.. Up to $4,000 of real or personal property value. Yes, annual claim with the county assessor. Apply by File by February 15 for the full exemption.. (Source: https://boe.ca.gov/proptaxes/veterans_exemption.htm)
• Proposition 19 base-year value transfer — Homeowners age 55 or older, severely and permanently disabled homeowners, and qualifying wildfire/natural-disaster victims transferring taxable value from an eligible principal residence to a replacement principal residence in California.. Transfers the factored base-year/taxable value of the original principal residence to the replacement residence, subject to Prop. 19 value-adjustment rules; age-55/severely disabled transfers may be used up to three times. Yes, file the applicable BOE-19 claim with the assessor in the county where the replacement home is located. Apply by Generally file within three years of the replacement home’s purchase or completion of construction; late filing may still qualify prospectively beginning with the year filed.. (Source: https://www.boe.ca.gov/pdf/pub801.pdf)
• State Property Tax Postponement Program — Homeowners who are seniors, blind, or have a disability, for current-year property taxes on a principal residence, if they meet program criteria including at least 40% equity and annual household income of $57,002 or less.. Defers current-year property taxes; the deferred amount is secured by a lien and must eventually be repaid. Yes, apply each program year through the California State Controller’s Office. Apply by 2026-27 filing period: opens 2026-10-01 and closes 2027-02-10.. (Source: https://sco.ca.gov/ardtax_prop_tax_postponement.html)
• Calamity / disaster reassessment relief — Owners of eligible property in Yolo County that sustains misfortune or calamity damage/destruction in excess of $10,000.. Assessor may re-evaluate the damaged property to obtain property tax adjustments; eligible taxpayers may also request deferral of the next secured-roll installment until a corrected bill is issued. Yes, file the Yolo County Assessor application for reassessment of damaged or destroyed property. Apply by Within 12 months of the misfortune or calamity; tax-deferral request must be filed on or before the next property-tax installment payment date.. (Source: https://assessor.yolocounty.gov/DocumentCenter/View/117/YC-20180917-PDF)

How to Look Up Your Property Record in Yolo County

You can look up your property's official record at https://common1.mptsweb.com/mbap/yolo/asr. Yolo County’s Assessor-linked MBAP search lets users search by fee parcel, assessment number, or street address; the help text says assessment search shows a specific assessment and fee-parcel search shows current or delinquent fiscal-year assessments outstanding or paid during the current fiscal year.