Arkansas Homestead Credit Explained: Tax Savings for Homeowners in 2026

Arkansas’s homestead credit (Ark. Code § 26-26-1118) cuts the property tax on an owner’s principal residence by $600 for assessment year 2025 and $675 from assessment year 2026. Register with the county assessor; no credit is allowed after October 15 of the year after the assessment.

$600 on the 2026 bills, $675 on the 2027 bills

The credit comes off the tax, not off assessed value: it “reduces the amount of real property taxes assessed on the homestead of each property owner” (§ 26-26-1118(a)(1)(A)).

An assessment year’s credit lands on the next year’s bill. The Department of Finance and Administration’s property tax relief page ties $600 to “the 2026 tax bills,” and DFA’s fiscal note on HB 1103 books the $675 cost to calendar year 2027. The saving is the credit itself, capped by what you owe: “The credit shall not exceed the amount of ad valorem property taxes owed” (Constitution, Amendment 79, § 3), and “an assessment shall not be reduced to less than zero dollars ($0.00)” (§ 26-26-1118(a)(1)(B)). The property tax calculator shows what is left to pay.

What § 26-26-1122 counts as a homestead and an owner

A homestead is “the dwelling of a person that is used as his or her principal place of residence with the contiguous land, excluding all land valued as agricultural land, pasture land, or timberland.” It includes a dwelling owned by:

• a revocable or irrevocable trust, lived in by the person who formed it;
• an irrevocable trust, lived in by a beneficiary, “as evidenced by submitting a signed, notarized, and file-marked copy of the irrevocable trust to the county assessor”;
• an LLC “whose members are either a married couple or otherwise no more than one (1) natural person,” at least one of whom claims the credit and lives there.

A property owner is the owner of record or the mortgagee, a buyer under a recorded contract to purchase, or a holder of a recorded life estate, plus a former owner still living in a tax-delinquent home held by the Commissioner of State Lands during redemption. An LLC’s proof must include a Secretary of State certificate of good standing and a signed member attestation of no other claim (§ 26-26-1118(b)(2)(A)(ii)).

Registering: the January 1 test and the October 15 cutoff

The assessor must identify homestead parcels before bills go out, but “Each property owner shall register with the county assessor proof of eligibility for the property tax credit if the property owner intends to claim a property tax credit” (§ 26-26-1118(b)(1)–(2)). Give the registration to the assessor, or attach it to the deed filed with the circuit clerk, who forwards it.

The statute sets both dates:

• the parcel “shall qualify as a homestead prior to January 1 of the year after assessment”;
• the credit “is not allowed after October 15 of the year after the assessment,” moving to the next business day if October 15 is a Saturday, Sunday or U.S. Postal Service holiday.

That puts the $600 claim for 2025 at October 15, 2026, and the $675 claim for 2026 at October 15, 2027.

One credit a year, and the § 26-26-1119 penalty

“Under no circumstance may a property owner claim more than one (1) homestead property tax credit per calendar year.” A second claim costs repayment plus a 100% penalty. If both claims are in one county, you may instead skip the credit statewide “for two (2) years for each year that the credit was claimed unlawfully”; a second-county claim must be paid with your taxes. You must “report to the county assessor a change in eligibility to claim a property tax credit or a change in use of the property prior to January 1 of the year following the change,” or face the same repayment and penalty plus the correct tax. An assessor’s finding can be appealed to county court within 30 days, and no penalty or repayment may be imposed more than three years after the credit was claimed.

Amendment 79: the 5% reappraisal cap and the 65-or-disabled freeze

After a county-wide reappraisal, a homestead’s first assessment may rise “not more than five percent (5%)” over the prior year, then 5% more each year until it reaches the reappraised value (§ 1(c)), “Except as provided in subsection (d)”. The cap “does not apply to newly discovered real property, new construction, or to substantial improvements to real property.”

Under § 1(d) and § 26-26-1124, an owner who is disabled or 65 or older is assessed at the lower of a later value or the value at purchase or construction (on or after January 1, 2001), on the 65th birthday or disability date, or on January 1, 2001 for those already qualified then. In a county covered by § 2 of the amendment (no county-wide reappraisal between 1986 and 2000), each of those January 1, 2001 dates is replaced by January 1 of the year after its § 2 adjustments were completed (§ 1(d)(5)). A nursing-home stay does not disqualify; one qualifying joint owner covers all; substantial improvements are excluded. § 26-26-1120(a) defines “disabled person” as disabled for Title XIX purposes, a permanently and totally disabled veteran under 38 C.F.R. § 4.1 et seq., or a recipient of permanent and total disability insurance benefits during the year. DFA says owners “must apply for the “freeze” with the county assessor’s office,” and a freeze “cannot pass or convey to a subsequent owner of the same home.”

A separate law: Article 9 and creditors

Article 9, § 3 of the Constitution shields the homestead of a resident “who is married or the head of a family” from “the lien of any judgment or decree of any court, or to sale under execution, or other process thereon, except such as may be rendered for the purchase money, or for specific liens, laborers’ or mechanics’ liens for improving the same, or for taxes, or against executors, administrators, guardians, receivers, attorneys for moneys collected by them, and other trustees of an express trust, for moneys due from them in their fiduciary capacity.”

Rural homestead (§ 4): “not exceeding one hundred and sixty acres,” value up to twenty-five hundred dollars, “and in no event shall the homestead be reduced to less than eighty acres, without regard to value.” Urban (§ 5): “not exceeding one acre,” the same $2,500 value limit, never “less than one-quarter of an acre of land, without regard to value.”

Arkansas homestead credit questions

I bought in August 2026. What do I claim?

The $675 for assessment year 2026, if the house is your principal residence before January 1, 2027 and you are not already claiming the credit on another home for 2026 (§ 26-26-1118(b)(4)(C) allows one per calendar year); register by October 15, 2027. A 2025 credit already on the parcel stays for that year and may be prorated with the seller by agreement. You must notify the assessor of the new use (§ 26-26-1118(b)(6)).

Does turning 65 raise my credit?

No. § 26-26-1118 sets one amount with no age tier; age 65 or disability opens the Amendment 79 freeze, applied for separately.

Can a judgment creditor force a sale?

Not on a judgment outside the § 3 exceptions, if you are married or head of a family and within the §§ 4–5 limits.

Related pages:

• Arkansas property tax rates and exemptions
• Selling a home in Arkansas
• Homestead rules by state
• Mississippi homestead exemption