Harris County Property Records — Texas Parcel & Ownership Data

Search Harris County TX property records instantly — owner names, parcel addresses, market values, appraised values, exemptions, and more. Built on the official HCAD (Harris County Appraisal District) bulk data file, updated quarterly.

From $0.05 per record — no HCAD account required.

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Why This Actor

Real estate investors, title researchers, and data analysts need Harris County parcel data but the official HCAD website offers no API. Manually exporting records is slow and doesn't scale. This actor gives you programmatic access to 1.8+ million Harris County property records in seconds.

What you get: structured JSON with owner name, situs address, market value, appraised value, land/improvement breakdown, year built, exemptions, and property class — no screenshots, no PDFs, no web scraping.

How it works: queries the official HCAD quarterly bulk file (~150MB, 1.8M records) with fast in-memory filtering. Falls back to the ArcGIS Open Data REST API automatically.

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Pricing

Pay-Per-Event (PPE): $0.05 per property record returned.

Event	Price
property_record	$0.05 / result

Platform fees apply. First 1,000 events free for new accounts.

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Quick Start

Input Parameters

Field	Type	Default	Description
searchType	string	bulk	account, address, owner, parcel, or bulk
query	string	""	Search term (ignored for bulk)
maxResults	integer	100	Max records to return (1–10,000)

Example: Search by Owner Name

from apify_client import ApifyClient

client = ApifyClient("APIFY_TOKEN")
run = client.actor("your-username/harris-county-property-records").start(
    run_input={
        "searchType": "owner",
        "query": "SMITH JOHN",
        "maxResults": 50,
    }
)
print(client.run(run["id"].split("/")[-1]).wait_for_finish())

Example: Search by Address

const Apify = require('apify-client');
const client = new ApifyClient({ token: 'APIFY_TOKEN' });
const { default: dataset } = await client.datasets.getOrCreate('harris-county-property-records');

const run = await client.actor('your-username/harris-county-property-records').start({
    searchType: 'address',
    query: '123 MAIN ST',
    maxResults: 100,
});

Example: cURL

curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/your-username~harris-county-property-records/runs?token=APIFY_TOKEN" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"searchType":"parcel","query":"001001000001","maxResults":10}'

Output Schema

Each record is a JSON object:

{
  "acct": "001001000001",
  "owner_name": "SMITH JOHN",
  "situs_addr": "123 MAIN ST HOUSTON TX 77001",
  "market_value": "250000",
  "appraised_value": "230000",
  "land_value": "80000",
  "improvement_value": "150000",
  "year_built": "1985",
  "property_class": "A",
  "exemptions": "HS"
}

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Search Types

Type	Behaviour
account	Exact match on HCAD account number
address	Case-insensitive substring match on situs address
owner	Case-insensitive substring match on owner name
parcel	Exact match on parcel ID
bulk	Returns the first N records (no filter)

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Competitor Comparison

Feature	This Actor	zinc_fish (HCAD Property Tax)
Data format	Structured JSON	Screenshots / unstructured
Data source	Official HCAD bulk file	Likely web scrape
No account required	Yes	Unknown
Fallback API	ArcGIS Open Data	None
Maintenance burden	Low (static quarterly file)	High (live scrape)
Approximate fail rate	< 1%	~11%
PPE pricing	$0.05/record	Free / unspecified

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FAQ

Do I need an HCAD account? No. This actor uses the publicly available HCAD bulk download file — no login, no API key, no account required.

How fresh is the data? HCAD publishes the full property bulk file quarterly. The data is current as of the most recent HCAD publication date.

Is there a rate limit? No hard rate limit. The actor runs server-side in Apify's infrastructure. For very large bulk queries, allow extra runtime.

What if HCAD changes their bulk file URL? The actor fetches the download page dynamically and parses the file URL. If the URL structure changes, the actor automatically falls back to the ArcGIS Open Data REST API.

How many records can I return? Up to 10,000 records per run. For higher volumes, use the bulk search type and paginate across multiple runs.

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Related Actors

• Dallas County Property Tax Records — peer Texas county actor
• US County Property Records (multi-county)