Buying a home in Florida

Most of what a buyer knows about houses travels well between states. The property tax figure on the listing does not. In most of the country it is a fair forecast of what the next owner will pay, because the assessment behind it moves slowly and moves for everybody at once. Florida is built the other way round: the assessment belongs to the owner rather than to the building, and the sale is the event that ends it.

The assessment is the seller's, and buying the house ends it

The Department of Revenue states the mechanism without hedging: A Florida purchase resets the assessment. The seller's Save Our Homes cap and homestead exemption stay with the property only for the rest of the calendar year of the sale, and on 1 January following the purchase the property appraiser strips the exemptions and reassesses at just value. A buyer's second-year bill is therefore usually well above the bill the seller was paying. (Florida Department of Revenue, Property Tax Information for First-Time Florida Homebuyers (PT-107); Fla. Const. Art. VII s. 4(d)(3); s. 193.155(3)(a), Fla. Stat., read 25 August 2026) None of that waits on an improvement, a permit or an appeal: the change of ownership is what does it. A buyer who budgeted off the seller's bill was not misled by anyone; they read a number describing a different owner's history at the same address.

Why the gap opens wider here than almost anywhere

Two provisions did that work, and both of them worked for the seller. The homestead exemption takes $50,000 (Florida Department of Revenue, Property Tax Information for Homestead Exemption (PT-113, R. 08/25); s. 196.031, Fla. Stat., read 25 August 2026) off the assessed value of a home its owner occupies as a permanent residence. Save Our Homes then limits how far the assessment underneath it may climb in a year, to 3% (Fla. Const. Art. VII s. 4(d)(1); s. 193.155(1), Fla. Stat.; Florida Department of Revenue guide PT-112, read 25 August 2026) or the change in consumer prices, whichever is lower. Run that for a decade in a market that has done what Florida's has and assessed value and sale price stop being related to each other. The bill on the listing is the arithmetic of the year the seller bought, carried forward under a lid. Yours will be the arithmetic of the price the two of you have just agreed.

You get the same protections back, later and from a higher floor

Nothing is being taken away from Florida buyers. The exemption and the cap restart, with you as the owner and your purchase as the new base, and that distinction is the whole practical point. Someone who reads the words homestead exemption and mentally restores the seller's bill has restored the wrong number: it comes off your assessment, which has just been marked to what you paid.

It is also something you have to ask for. The deadline is March 1 of the tax year. The applicant must hold title and occupy the home as a permanent residence on 1 January of that year, and files Form DR-501 with the county property appraiser. (Florida Department of Revenue, Property Tax Information for Homestead Exemption (PT-113, R. 08/25); s. 196.011, Fla. Stat., read 25 August 2026) Missing it costs a full tax year of the exemption, on precisely the bill that was already going to be higher than expected. A buyer already holding a Florida homestead and moving within the state need not abandon the gap built up between just value and assessed value either. It can be carried across, up to $500,000 (s. 193.155(8)(a), Fla. Stat.; Florida Department of Revenue guide PT-112, read 25 August 2026), on its own form filed alongside the exemption. Selling in one county and buying in another is where it is most often left behind.

If it will not be your permanent residence

A second home, a place you use for part of the year, a house a relative will live in: none of those is a homestead, and Florida treats them visibly rather than slightly differently. The exemption does not apply. In its place there is a weaker limit on assessment growth, 10% (Fla. Const. Art. VII s. 4(g); s. 193.1554, Fla. Stat., read 25 August 2026) a year, and it leaves the school portion of the bill uncapped. It re-bases on a change of ownership as well, so it starts you at what you paid in the same way. Anyone buying now and meaning to move in later should know the clock on the stronger protections starts when the exemption does, not when the deed is signed.

The multiplier is public; the number it multiplies is not, yet

The other half of the bill is the millage, and that half is published. Across every Florida county, total millage came to 1.64% (Florida Department of Revenue, Property Tax Oversight, 2025 Data Book: Millage and Taxes Levied Report and Taxable Value Report, read 25 August 2026) for each dollar of taxable value in the most recent year the Department has published. Counties, school boards and special districts set it, and it does not move because you bought something. What moves is the value it applies to. So the route to a real figure before closing is not to adjust the seller's bill upward by feel; it is to ask the county property appraiser what the property would be assessed at, at just value, with no exemption on it.

If the home is a condominium, read the association's budget

Most states leave the upkeep of a condominium building to whatever the association judges it can afford this year. Florida stopped doing that, and the change arrives at the individual owner as money. Florida puts two structural obligations on condominium buildings of three habitable stories or more, and both feed straight into a buyer's carrying cost. A milestone inspection by a licensed engineer or architect is required by 31 December of the year the building turns 30, and every ten years after, with local authorities able to move that to 25 years for buildings near salt water. Separately, a structural integrity reserve study must be completed at least every ten years, covering roof, structure, fireproofing, plumbing, electrical, waterproofing and exterior painting, and windows and exterior doors. For budgets adopted on or after 31 December 2024, unit owners can no longer vote to waive or underfund the reserves that study identifies. (s. 553.899 and s. 718.112(2)(f) and (g), Fla. Stat., read 25 August 2026) The reserve line in a condominium budget is no longer a question of what this year's owners feel like funding, and a building that has been underfunding it has catching up to do. The budget, the reserve study and the inspection status say more about what that unit costs to own than the asking price does.

Loan size, and the one county that is not like the rest

The conforming limit does not decide what anyone can borrow, but it is the line at which a loan stops being an agency loan, so it is worth knowing where it sits. The one-unit baseline is $832,750 (Federal Housing Finance Agency, Full County Loan Limit List 2026 (HERA-based, final, flat file), read 25 August 2026). Monroe County is the only Florida county above the baseline: $990,150 for one unit, $1,267,600 for two, $1,532,200 for three and $1,904,150 for four. The other 66 counties are all at the $832,750 baseline. (Federal Housing Finance Agency, Full County Loan Limit List 2026 (HERA-based, final, flat file), read 25 August 2026) That list is redrawn every year, and which county appears on it can change as well as the amounts.

Who supervises the people you will actually deal with

The Office of Financial Regulation, an office of the Financial Services Commission, licenses loan originators, mortgage brokers and mortgage lenders under Chapter 494 of the Florida Statutes, titled Loan Originators and Mortgage Brokers. (s. 494.001(29) and s. 494.0025(1)-(3), Fla. Stat.; s. 20.121(3)(a)2, Fla. Stat., read 25 August 2026) That is where a licence is checked and where a complaint is filed, and both are worth doing before your bank statements go anywhere. BEDRWay is not a lender, a broker or a servicer, and does not originate in Florida or anywhere else. A request sent here goes in front of a mortgage professional licensed where the property is, and they are the ones who say what is available.