Filling Out the Texas Seller’s Disclosure Notice in Bryan-College Station: The Local Questions That Trip Sellers Up

Seller Tips · September 2026 · 8 min read

Of all the paperwork a Bryan-College Station seller signs, the Texas Seller’s Disclosure Notice is the one most likely to come back and cause trouble months after closing. It is also the one most sellers fill out fastest — at the kitchen table, in fifteen minutes, checking boxes from memory. That mismatch is the problem. Nearly every disclosure dispute in the Brazos Valley traces back to a box someone checked "No" on because they were not sure, rather than "Unknown" because they honestly were not.

The form itself is required by Section 5.008 of the Texas Property Code for sellers of a previously occupied single-family home, and the Texas Real Estate Commission adopted a meaningfully updated version (Form 55-0) effective July 1, 2026. If you last sold a house here in 2021, the document in front of you is not the one you remember. Below is what changed, plus the questions that carry extra weight specifically because the house is in Brazos County.

What changed on the 2026 Texas Seller’s Disclosure Notice

TREC’s July 2026 revision added several disclosure items that did not exist on the older form. None of them are hard to answer, but they are easy to skip if you are pattern-matching against a version you have seen before.

Homeowners insurance history — sellers now disclose whether they have been unable to obtain coverage on the property. Given how much Texas insurance pricing and underwriting has shifted, this one matters to buyers doing their own quote shopping during the option period.
Water rights — a new standalone form, TREC No. 61-0, covers groundwater and surface water: whether the property sits in a groundwater conservation district and whether there are water wells on it.
Permanently installed generators — a separate line item now, rather than something buried in a general systems question.
Private roads — relevant on acreage and on some of the older county tracts around the edges of Bryan and out toward Wellborn.
Above-ground storage tanks over 500 gallons and conservation easements — again, mostly a rural-tract issue, but the Brazos Valley has plenty of those.

Your agent should be handing you the current version. If the form you are looking at does not mention insurance availability or generators, ask before you sign it.

The floodplain and flooding questions in Bryan-College Station

The disclosure asks separately about whether the property is in a floodplain, whether it has flooded, and whether you have flood insurance. Sellers often conflate all three and answer as if they were one question. They are not, and in the Brazos Valley the distinction is real.

Carters Creek, Burton Creek, Wolf Pen Creek, and Still Creek run through developed parts of Bryan and College Station, and the mapped flood fringe along them catches back yards and corners of lots in neighborhoods where nobody thinks of themselves as living near water. A house can sit in a mapped Special Flood Hazard Area at the rear property line while the structure itself has never taken an inch. That is a "yes" on the floodplain question and a truthful "no" on the flooding question, with an explanation in the comments.

The reverse also happens. Street ponding during a heavy Brazos Valley rain that pushed water into a garage is water penetration you knew about, whether or not FEMA has your lot shaded. Disclose it, describe it, and note what you did about it. Buyers forgive a documented past problem with a documented fix far more readily than they forgive discovering it themselves in July.

Foundation work, soil movement, and the "previous repairs" line

Bryan-College Station sits on expansive clay soils that swell and shrink with our wet-dry cycles. Slab movement here is common enough that experienced local buyers are not automatically scared off by a repaired foundation — they are scared off by an undisclosed one, because it makes them wonder what else you left out.

If piers were installed, say so, and pull the paperwork. Many foundation companies working this market issue transferable lifetime warranties, and a transferable warranty turns a red flag into a selling point. Same logic applies to plumbing done after a repair, sewer line work, and any engineer’s letter you have. If you bought the house with existing repairs and never got the documents, disclose what you know and mark the rest "Unknown" — that is what the column is there for.

One more local note: cosmetic drywall cracking and doors that stick seasonally are extremely common here. You are not required to be a structural engineer. You are required to report what you actually know.

MUDs, PIDs, wells, and septic in the Brazos Valley

The disclosure asks whether the property is located in a Municipal Utility District. In a market where a good deal of the newer inventory around College Station and out along the Highway 47 and Wellborn corridors sits inside special districts, this is not a throwaway question — it changes the buyer’s monthly payment. If you are not certain, your closing documents from when you bought, or the tax entities listed on your Brazos County appraisal notice, will tell you.

The new water rights form matters more here than in a purely urban market. Brazos County falls within the Brazos Valley Groundwater Conservation District, so properties with wells have a real answer to give. And once you get outside city utility service — the county tracts, parts of Wellborn, land toward Millican and Kurten — you are often on well water, an aerobic or conventional septic system, or both. For septic, buyers will want to know the system type, the last pump-out, and whether there is a maintenance contract in place, because aerobic systems in Texas typically require one.

How to answer without creating liability for yourself

The disclosure asks what you know. It does not ask you to inspect, investigate, or guarantee. A few habits keep sellers out of trouble:

Use "Unknown" honestly. It is a legitimate answer and it is safer than a guess dressed up as a fact.
Fill in the comment lines. A one-sentence explanation next to a checked box is worth more than the box itself.
Attach the paper. Warranties, receipts, permits, engineer reports, prior inspection reports you received as a buyer — all of it reduces the room for later argument.
Remember that selling "as-is" limits your duty to repair, not your duty to disclose. That is a common and expensive misunderstanding.
Update the notice if something changes between listing and closing — a new leak, a failed AC compressor in August, a hail claim.
Do not describe neighborhoods, neighbors, or who lives nearby. Stick strictly to the physical condition and history of the property.

A handful of transfers are exempt from the Section 5.008 requirement altogether — foreclosure and trustee sales, certain court-ordered transfers, and some estate sales where the executor never lived in the home, among others. Exemptions are narrower than people assume, and an executor who did occupy the property generally does not qualify. If you think you might be exempt, confirm it with a real estate attorney rather than assuming.

Working through it with someone who knows the market

The practical value of a local agent on this form is not filling it out for you — the disclosure is yours, in your words, from your knowledge. It is knowing which questions carry weight in Bryan-College Station and asking you about them before a buyer’s inspector does. Rick works this market every day, has seen how Brazos Valley buyers react to foundation history and floodplain lines, and would rather spend an extra hour with you on the disclosure than spend a week renegotiating after an inspection.

This article is general information, not legal advice — for questions about your specific situation, talk with a Texas real estate attorney. If you are thinking about listing a home in College Station, Bryan, or anywhere in the Brazos Valley this fall, reach out to Rick and let’s go through your disclosure together before the sign goes in the yard.