Texas car-buying rules
These are the rules the Before the Lot planner uses for Texas, with the source and date for each. They describe the rules and the planner's estimate; they are not legal or tax advice, and the dealer's quote and your state's documents are what count.
Dealer doc fee in Texas
No dollar cap, with rules on how the fee is shown.
No hard cap. A doc fee of $225 or less is presumed reasonable. To charge more, the dealer must first file a notice and a cost analysis with the OCCC, which can order the fee reduced. The fee must be the same for cash and credit buyers and carry the notice 'A DOCUMENTARY FEE IS NOT AN OFFICIAL FEE'. $225 since July 11, 2024; a June 2026 OCCC proposal tightens the cost-analysis rules and keeps $225 (Tex. Fin. Code 348.006; 7 TAC 84.205).
Sales tax in Texas
- Tax: Motor vehicle sales and use tax.
- State rate used: 6.25%.
- Local add-ons: None on cars.
- Dollar cap on the tax: none in the data.
6.25% on price minus trade-in. No city or county tax on vehicles.
Trade-in tax credit
Yes. Texas takes the trade-in value off the taxed price.
Does a maker's rebate lower the taxed price?
Yes. Pub 96-254 (3/2026): 'Both manufacturer's and dealer's rebates passed directly to customers reduce the total consideration'; must be separately stated. Standard presumptive value applies only to private-party used sales.
Cancellation and return rights
No Texas-specific right to cancel or return a dealership purchase is in the planner's data.
There is no federal cooling-off period for buying a car at a dealership; the FTC's door-to-door Cooling-Off Rule excludes dealers with a permanent place of business (16 CFR 429.3(a)). The FTC CARS Rule was vacated by the Fifth Circuit in January 2025 and formally withdrawn effective Feb 12, 2026 (91 FR 6507). No other state with a general used-car cooling-off right was found; NCLC calls California's the first in the nation.
Worked out-the-door example: a $35,000 vehicle
Built with the planner's own out-the-door formula: the tax is the state base rate times the vehicle price plus the doc fee, with no trade-in, rounded to the cent. Local taxes are not included.
| Line | Amount |
|---|---|
| Vehicle price (example) | $35,000 |
| Doc fee (the planner's default, an example amount only; there is no cap) | $450 |
| Sales tax at 6.25% on $35,450 | $2,215.63 |
| Title and registration (the planner's default estimate) | $250 |
| Out-the-door total | $37,915.63 |
Title and registration fees differ by state and vehicle; $250 is a placeholder, not a Texas figure.
Plan a purchase in Texas
Plan a purchase in Texas opens the free planner with Texas already chosen. Nothing is sent to a server; the choice rides in the link's fragment.
These rules feed two steps of the method: set your numbers and let dealers compete. To read a dealer's quote line by line, see reading an out-the-door quote. All states.