Jackson County, Missouri homeowners who would rather keep their right to sue than join the property tax reassessment settlement have until November 18, 2026 to put a letter in the mail. The exclusion request has to be postmarked by that date, five days before a Kansas City judge holds the approval hearing on November 23. Most owners in the class never need to write anything, so the letter matters to a small group with a specific reason to stay out.
The settlement resolves a class action over the county’s 2023 reassessment. The official settlement website defines the class as owners of residential real property in Jackson County who paid real property taxes and whose 2023 assessment rose by more than 15 percent over the prior cycle, not counting increases caused only by new construction or improvements. OpenClassActions puts the class at about 207,000 owners.
That leaves one question for every owner in the class: stay in and take the settlement’s terms, or mail an exclusion letter by November 18 and keep the right to sue the county separately. Staying in takes no action from owners who still hold the property. Leaving means giving up the settlement’s benefits, so it is a choice to make on purpose and before the postmark date.
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Who would send an exclusion letter?
Opting out is for owners who want their own day in court. The settlement website says anyone who excludes themselves receives no settlement benefits and does not release their claims. They keep the right to sue at their own expense. The decision mostly concerns owners who already have a case against the county over the 2023 assessment, or who plan to bring one.
For everyone else, leaving carries a cost. The website describes the credit as equal to the amount an owner overpaid for 2023 and 2024, meaning the difference between the taxes paid and the taxes that would have been due at the same rates had the increase been capped at 15 percent. An owner who opts out does not receive it.
The website adds one carve-out: “Claims certified for classwide declaratory and injunctive relief cannot be excluded.” It does not spell out what that means in practice, and the class administrator is the place to ask.
How the November 18 postmark works
The website tells owners to mail a letter postmarked by the deadline. It does not print a separate exclusion address on its front page and points readers to its opt-out page for the instructions. The only mailing address it lists is for the class administrator: PO Box 2010, Chanhassen, MN 55317-2010. The administrator’s phone number is 888-969-3783.
A postmark is the post office’s date stamp, and a letter dropped in a box after the last pickup can carry a later date than the day it was mailed. Owners who plan to opt out have an obvious reason to mail early and keep a copy. The website also asks owners not to call or write the court or the county with questions and to use the administrator instead.
Owners who want to stay in but object to the settlement’s terms face the same date. OpenClassActions lists November 18, 2026 as the postmark deadline for both exclusions and objections.
What the November 23 hearing decides
The court will hold what the website calls a Fairness Hearing in Division 60 of the Circuit Court of Jackson County, Missouri, in Kansas City. It begins at 9:30 a.m. on Monday, November 23, 2026. The judge decides whether to approve the settlement, and by then every exclusion request and objection is supposed to be in.
Owners who remain in the class and still hold their property receive the credit without filing anything. The website says it is applied in three equal installments on the 2026, 2027 and 2028 tax bills, with any unused amount carried forward. Former owners are on a different track. They must submit a claim form by December 3, 2026.
The county is also setting up a $6,000,000 Special Circumstances Fund to reimburse documented out-of-pocket appraisal and legal fees. The website says there is no cap on an individual claim, and if approved claims exceed the fund, payments are reduced proportionately. Those claims are also due December 3, 2026.
What an owner gives up by leaving
The settlement website is the one record that sets all of these dates, and it spells out the trade. Staying in means the credit and no filing. Opting out means no settlement benefits and a lawsuit paid for by the owner. There is no middle path after the hearing, because the court’s approval would bind everyone who did not mail a letter in time.
What no public record shows is how many owners will choose to leave, or what an individual owner’s credit will be. The website points to an Estimated Credit page for that figure, and an owner weighing an exclusion has to know it before the postmark date, not after the judge rules.
Mailing a Jackson County exclusion letter before November 18?
An owner who weighs this decision in late November has already missed it. The postmark date comes before the hearing, and the claim dates for former owners and the fee fund come after it, so four dates in one notice are easy to mix up.
The Settlement & Refund Recovery System includes the four-date rule for reading a settlement notice and a claim log and payment tracker, so the November 18, November 23 and December 3 dates sit in one place. It also comes with the scam-proof rules for telling real settlement notices from imitations.
Track the Jackson County November 18 and 23 dates in the Settlement & Refund Recovery System →
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This article was produced with AI assistance and edited for accuracy against the sources linked above.
