Tampa Bay, FL -- Taxes?

Question

What's the deal with property taxes, or, for that matter, with all the taxes in Florida? I live in Texas and there's a property tax of the total property value set usually around 1.5 to 2%. That's roughly $5000 for a $250,000 home. In Florida, it seems, taxes are MUCH lower for property. This seems too good to be true. Yet, there are countless legislative bills going through demanding that taxes be lowered. What is really going here? How much would an average resident expect to pay annually in taxes (not just property)?

Also, can anyone explain what 'millage' is? I'm completely lost here and am obviously missing something if you can move to Florida, have a million dollar home and barely pay anything in taxes on it (~$10,000 or so annually).

Assuming the tax rate is really that low, how does the state actually pay to upkeep roads or pay for schools, etc.? It would seem you'd need at least some form of tax (at least one which would generate more revenue for the state) to pay for said things. In Texas, property taxes, as stated before, are much, much higher than those I've seen in Florida. Is Florida taxing businesses more than Texas perhaps? Sounds like a good plan to me.

Answer 1

You're right. Compared with most states taxes are low in Florida. But property taxes in used to be a lot lower. I don't think $5,000 on a $250,000 home is bad when you consider that Florida has no income tax.

Millage is just a term for the tax rate you pay based on the assessed value of your home. In some states, that rate is expressed as a dollar amount/$100. In other states the rate is expressed in mills. A mill is technically a tenth of a percent of the assessed value (from mili=1/1,000). So if your tax rate was 20 mills, it would be 2%

Answer 2

TX and FL have some of the highest property taxes in the country since neither state has an income tax. Without an income tax, they need to get the money from some place and that's normally property taxes and sales taxes.

Don't know where you pay only 1.5% to 2% in TX but it must be seriously in the sticks to be that low. Either that or the tax district is doing a lousy job keeping up with the FMV of the property, as is required by state law in TX. I paid over 3.4% in the San Antonio area. I'm paying less than 1/5 of that in MO.

Millage is the term some states use to describe the tax rate. 1 mill equals 1/1000 of a dollar or 1/10 of a cent. For example, the proposed 2007 millage rates in the Miami-Dade area vary from 20 to 26. That would mean taxes of $2,000 to $2,600 on a $100,000 property or $20,000 to $26,000 on a $1 million property. (By comparison, my millage rate in MO is around 7.)

Answer 3

It is too good to be true. I live in the Tampa area. The reason why there is demand for lower taxes is because during the housing boom everyone's property shot up in value on paper which caused the tax rolls to get way big. Now that the housing bubble has burst and the 2004 storms came through no one can afford to pay the taxes with the mortgages and keep or find any home owner's insurance and the state insurer of last resort Citizens is totally corrupt. I am from Dallas originally ad I would tell you to stay in TX FL is not where you want to be. we are moving back to TX asap!

Answer 4

For one thing, county taxes, which property taxes are, will have differing rates depending on what particular county the property in question is in.

Florida's still recovering from hurricane Katrina damage, but to a lesser extent than Louisiana. After the storm hit, the state government has lowered tax rates to help property owners "bounce back" for lack of a better term from the devastation.

The other thing you may not have recognized is that a lot of millionaires have vacation homes and other properties in the state, and politicians are well-known for giving folks a break on taxes in order to stimulate the economy.