Why your home's property tax goes up after you buy in Florida
Nelson Paredes · REALTOR® · One Stop Realty Center Inc
Updated October 20, 2026
From scratch
Florida revalues the home at its full market value on the January 1 after the sale. The limit that protected the seller does not pass to you.
Your tax does not continue the seller's: it starts from the home's real value. The listing's bill is the previous owner's history.
Verified October 18, 2026 against the current text of §193.155 and §193.1554 of the Florida Statutes (Save Our Homes, the cap without homestead and revaluation on a change of ownership) and the Florida Department of Revenue. The official value of your home is set by your county Property Appraiser.
Two identical homes on the same street can pay very different taxes. It is not a county mistake: it is the law working as written.
Amendment 3 is on the November 3 ballot. On November 3, 2026, Florida voters decide Amendment 3. If it passes, the numbers in this guide would change starting in 2027: what would change. If that date has passed, confirm the result with your county Property Appraiser.
According to the Orange County Property Appraiser, there would be a larger exemption that does not apply to school taxes; people arriving from another state would need 5 years of Florida residency to get it; and the increase cap for homes without a homestead would drop from 10% to 5%. It needs 60% of the votes.
The Property Appraiser (the county office that values properties) works with two numbers:
- Just value: what the home is worth on the market. It is the starting point of every valuation.
- Assessed value: the value your tax is actually calculated on. On a home with the same owner for many years it can sit far below just value.
The distance between the two comes from Save Our Homes. When a home has homestead (the tax exemption for people who live in it), the law limits how much its assessed value can rise each year: the lesser of 3% or the change in the consumer price index (CPI), as the Department of Revenue also summarizes. The faster the market rises, the wider the gap. It is a benefit of the owner who lives there, and it builds up over the years.
Note what it limits: the value, not the tax rates. If the county, the city or the school district raise theirs, the bill can rise even while the assessed value is held back.
The law says that when a property changes owners by sale, foreclosure or transfer of title, it is revalued at its just value on the following January 1 (§193.155, subsection 3). There are written exceptions, such as transfers between spouses. The seller's accumulated cap is not inherited, and neither are their exemptions: they are personal.
- 1The year you buyThe bill still comes out on the old value, the seller's, and at closing (the day you sign the purchase) it is split between the two of you.
- 2The next January 1The home is revalued at its current just value. In August the proposed-tax notice (the TRIM) arrives and you see your new base. That is the blow, or the confirmation.
- 3From there, your own capIf you file for homestead, you start your own Save Our Homes from the full value, and your increases are limited from the year after your exemption. How to file is in the homestead guide.
Without homestead there is no 3% cap. There is another one, 10% a year (Statute §193.1554), which resets to just value when the owner changes. So if you will not live in the home, your math is higher.
What the seller can take with them. If the seller moves to another home in Florida, they can transfer up to $500,000 of their accumulated benefit to the new one (portability, Article VII, Section 4 of the Constitution). It is their process on THEIR new home: it does not lower your base on this one by a dollar.
The same works for you if you already have a homestead in Florida and move. The Department of Revenue puts it this way: if you moved from one Florida homestead to another within the last three years, you may take part of your savings with you. The Property Appraiser confirms the details.
A home's tax is: the value it is charged on × each authority's tax rates + fixed charges. The rate is called millage: it is what is charged per $1,000 of value, so 20 mills are $20 per $1,000. Fixed charges (called non-ad valorem, such as a PACE or a CDD) are on the same bill, but on separate lines.
Illustration, not a quote. The numbers below are round and invented: a home with a just value of $450,000, a school millage of 6.5, a non-school one of 12, and an exemption of $25,000 against all taxes plus another $25,000 against non-school ones. They are not the current rates or exemptions of any place.
Who Value it pays on Tax per year (example) Seller, with years of Save Our Homes (assessed value of $82,000) $57,000 school and $32,000 non-school About $755 Buyer who lives there and files for homestead $425,000 school and $400,000 non-school About $7,560 Buyer who does not live there (no homestead) $450,000 on everything About $8,325 In this example the same home pays ten times more than the listing would say, because it cites the current bill, the seller's. That number speaks about the past, not your future.
- Ignore the listing's tax and do your own math with the home's just value. Its page on the Property Appraiser's site (for example, Miami-Dade's) shows the three values: market, assessed and the one it is charged on.
- Ask about the fixed charges on that home's bill, because no exemption covers them.
- Ask your lender to calculate the tax deposit (the escrow) with the new estimated tax, so the jump does not also hit you as a shortage a year later.
- File for your homestead on time, if the home will be your permanent residence.
What cannot be known beforehand: the official just value the Property Appraiser will set on the January 1 after your purchase (it can land above or below your price) and the final rates each authority adopts that fall. That is why every earlier figure is an estimate. If the value looks high to you, the TRIM opens the way to ask for a review before your county's Value Adjustment Board, with a deadline and with market evidence for your property.
We help you work out the tax you will really owe.
The one in the listing is the seller's. Leave us your number and we take care of it with you: we work out the home you like, with its value and the rates of its area.
This guide orients you, it does not advise you. The example uses round invented numbers, not those of any home or area. The official value is set by your county Property Appraiser and the tax rates are adopted by each authority; until then, any figure is an estimate.
