Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has unveiled his plan to radically reform the state’s property tax system, potentially eliminating taxes on most owner-occupied homes.
DeSantis called for a special legislative session to begin Monday, where state lawmakers can consider putting a new initiative to make homestead property tax-free on the ballot. If approved, Florida voters would be able to vote in November.
“Taxing something that you own repeatedly, which is a property tax, is the worst way to do taxation,” DeSantis said at a press conference on Wednesday. “You pay all these taxes to acquire that property, and then year after year you have to write a check just for the privilege of being able to maintain ownership of something that is supposedly yours.”
DeSantis proposes raising the state’s homestead exemption, currently set at $50,000 for owner-occupied houses, to a $250,000 limit, which he estimates would eliminate property tax for 60% of Florida homeowners.
“If it’s successful, when you raise it to the $500,000 limit, that’s 92% of all Florida residents would be tax-free. I think this bottom-up approach is a better approach,” the governor said.
A number of states have considered property tax rollbacks recently, including Ohio. A similar bill was recently introduced in Michigan.
Developing story, more to follow.
Tristan Navera is a senior reporter on housing policy, covering trends and solutions in the housing market from Washington, DC. He was previously a senior reporter at Bloomberg Law, and before that covered real estate for the Washington Business Journal. Earlier in his career, he spent a decade reporting on business and real estate in Dayton and Columbus, OH. A Cincinnati native, he holds a journalism degree from Ohio University.
