Run a business in Henderson County? You owe a rendition by April 15

Texas doesn't have a state income tax, but it does tax the stuff a business uses to make money. The coolers in a Gun Barrel City bait shop, the lifts in an Athens garage, the inventory on a store's shelves: all of it is business personal property, and the Henderson County Appraisal District is the office that values it. The district appraises every real and business personal property account in the county.

The way the district learns what you own is the rendition, a report listing your own good-faith estimate of the taxable inventory, furniture, fixtures, machinery, and equipment you owned or managed as of January 1. You file it with Henderson CAD on Enterprise Street, and the statewide deadline is April 15. Miss it without an approved extension and the appraisal district can tack on a penalty and simply estimate your value for you, rarely in your favor.

Keep this in its own lane. The rendition is a county appraisal matter, separate from the sales-tax permit you hold with the Comptroller and from anything federal. A tidy fixed-asset list makes the April filing a short job rather than a scramble.