How to find out when your house was really built

Question, scoped The listing or the appraisal district says "year built: 1940". How do you check it? As of October 2026. The method is general; examples are Texas. The answer The appraisal district's year built is often an estimate entered decades after the fact. Treat it as a starting point and test it against records that were created at the time. 1. Deed records at the county clerk. Trace the chain of title back. A jump in sale price between two transfers often marks when a house was built on a vacant lot. 2. Sanborn maps, for towns that were mapped. Find the first edition that shows the building. 3. City directories. Look the address up year by year; the first year it appears with a resident is a close bound. Many directories are scanned on library and genealogy sites. 4. Building permits. Older cities may hold permit cards by address; ask the building department or file a public information request. 5. Aerial photographs and historical topographic maps (USGS EarthExplorer and topoView) give you before-and-after bounds. 6. The house itself. Wire nails replaced cut nails in the 1890s; framing lumber sizes, windows and wiring all have date ranges. This narrows a range but rarely gives a year. Sourced County clerk deed records, the Library of Congress Sanborn collection (https://www.loc.gov/collections/sanborn-maps/), USGS (https://ngmdb.usgs.gov/topoview/), and directories. What would change this answer Finding the original permit or a dated construction document. One primary record beats all the inference above.