Your mailing address does not tell you your county

This is the mistake I correct most often, and it is expensive in both directions, because the county decides your property tax rate and your school district.

Start with Nolensville. Zip 37135 is mostly Williamson County, but it reaches into Davidson and Rutherford. The Burkitt Road corridor is the clearest example: Burkitt Place has a Nolensville 37135 mailing address on every parcel and sits entirely in Davidson County. Metro Council district, Metro tax district, Metro zoning, plats recorded through Metro Planning. That means Metro Nashville Public Schools and the Davidson County rate, not Williamson.

I have seen a well ranked real estate page market that subdivision under a headline naming Williamson County Schools. It is wrong on every county record I checked, and a buyer who relies on it is making a six figure decision on bad information.

Spring Hill is split between Williamson and Maury Counties, and the line runs through the middle of town. Same city, same mailing address, two different county tax rates and two different county school systems. Harvest Point is on the Maury side. June Lake and Wades Grove are on the Williamson side. Even the developers do not always agree with the directories: Del Webb places Southern Springs in Maury County while a large third party site places it in Williamson.

Goodlettsville straddles Davidson and Sumner, with the northern half in Sumner. Copper Creek and Braxton Park are on the Sumner side. Windsor Green and Dry Creek Farms are on the Davidson side.

The fix is simple and I do it on every address. Pull the parcel record from the county assessor and read the county off the record itself, not off the envelope. If the parcel appears in Metro Nashville records, it is Davidson County. Metro records cover only Davidson.

Ask me before you get attached to a house. This takes about two minutes and it is the difference between the tax bill you expected and the one you get.