Question regarding real estate taxes in Sarasota? (Homestead, Venice: rental, homeowners insurance)

[SeekingWarmth211]

It seems like the tax structure varies from community to community in Sarasota. Some homes are paying upwards of 5k while others are below 2k.
Please shed some lite on this topic and if you could, provide a list of those areas less heavily levied..many thanx!!!

[bbronston]

Taxes are a combination of "ad valorem taxes" that are based on the value of the property and "non-ad valorem" where the tax amount is fixed and not dependent on the taxable value of the property. Some properties you've looked at might have higher non ad valorem taxes than others. For example, in communities that are Community Development Districts ("CDD") with CDD taxes, the non ad valorem tax will be higher than a similarly valued house in a non CDD community.

On the ad valorem side, Florida has a law called Save Our Homes which can greatly affect the amount of tax collected on a property. You may be seeing properties where the Save Our Homes law has had an impact. The same applies to certain homestead exemptions that qualified owners can use to reduce the taxable value of their property. You can read about Save Our Homes and how the county arrives at taxable values at the Sarasota County Property Appraiser's office website Sarasota Property Appraiser - Home.

By the way, because of the different things that affect the amount of tax actually owed on a property, you should not rely on the amount you see as a tax figure as an indication of the amount you will be taxed once you purchase a property. Circumstances change, taxes change.

[TamRE]

Taxes will not only vary from community to community but from home to home.

Property Tax Disclosure: Buyer should not rely on the seller's current property taxes as the amount of property taxes that the buyer may be obligated to pay in the year subsequent to purchase. A change of ownership or property improvements triggers reassessment of the property that could result in higher property taxes. If you have any questions concerning valuation, contact the county property appraiser's office for information. Sarasota Property Appraiser - Home
The home you are interested in purchasing may be homestead. Homesteading caps the tax assessments on the home during ownership. MLS records do not necessarily reflect current tax assessments.

[staywarm2]

Originally Posted by TamRE

Property Tax Disclosure: Buyer should not rely on the seller's current property taxes as the amount of property taxes that the buyer may be obligated to pay in the year subsequent to purchase. A change of ownership or property improvements triggers reassessment of the property that could result in higher property taxes. If you have any questions concerning valuation, contact the county property appraiser's office for information. Sarasota Property Appraiser - Home
The home you are interested in purchasing may be homestead. Homesteading caps the tax assessments on the home during ownership. MLS records do not necessarily reflect current tax assessments.

So, if we are interested in a particular property in Sarasota Co. and want to know what the property tax would be on that property if we purchased it at a certain price, do we e-mail the Sarasota Property Appraiser and ask that question about that particular property? Will they give me an exact amount? Otherwise, how would we figure out how much the property tax would be BEFORE I buy the home????

I've looked at the property appraiser website and don't see how to figure it out by myself!

Also, how do we find out what the homeowners insurance would cost? Do individual companies still write policies on homes in SW FL?

Thanks!

[TamRE]

You can go by what the current owner paid previously as a baseline for taxes and then determine what your differences would be - homestead exemption or other exemptions they had. The property appraiser may or may not tell you what they would be. Again the home will probably be re-assessed after you purchase it. The title company or closing agency will get a dollar amount of the taxes for closing. Taxes are paid in arrears, meaning they are not due until the end of the year. If you buy a home in the middle of the year, the current owner will pay up to the day of closing and you pay for the remainder of the year. If you are obtaining a mortage, the lender usually will require taxes to be in escrow.

For homeowner insurance you would have to contact an insurance agent to get a quote for a home you are interested in. The only difference may be if you have a wind mitigation inspection done on the home. That may give you some discounts that the home has such as type of roof, age of home, hurricane protection, in a flood zone or not, etc. You can go to www.floodsmart.gov and type in the address of the home. It will give you a flood rating, a range of costs, and insurance companies to contact.

[staywarm2]

Originally Posted by TamRE

You can go by what the current owner paid previously as a baseline for taxes and then determine what your differences would be - homestead exemption or other exemptions they had. The property appraiser may or may not tell you what they would be. Again the home will probably be re-assessed after you purchase it. The title company or closing agency will get a dollar amount of the taxes for closing. Taxes are paid in arrears, meaning they are not due until the end of the year. If you buy a home in the middle of the year, the current owner will pay up to the day of closing and you pay for the remainder of the year. If you are obtaining a mortage, the lender usually will require taxes to be in escrow.

For homeowner insurance you would have to contact an insurance agent to get a quote for a home you are interested in. The only difference may be if you have a wind mitigation inspection done on the home. That may give you some discounts that the home has such as type of roof, age of home, hurricane protection, in a flood zone or not, etc. You can go to www.floodsmart.gov and type in the address of the home. It will give you a flood rating, a range of costs, and insurance companies to contact.

Thanks for the advice.

It looks like all I can get is what the previous owner paid (+/- Homestead deduction) in property tax. If that person had lived the the house many years, surely the reassessment for me would be a substantial amount more? Then the amount of property taxes would also be more. Unless there is a millage rate that I can use to "guestimate" what the tax would be, then using the present owner's tax bill would be good if they had owned the house only a couple of years, and maybe not even then. Before I buy a home out of state, I would want to have a reasonable guess of what my property tax bill would be before I made an offer and/or went to closing.

I have worked with agents in other states where they would quote a certain given percent that I could take times the purchase price I wanted to pay to get a reasonable guess of what the tax would be.

[bbronston]

You can print out the current property tax bill and use the purchase price as the assessed value on each taxing authority line, deduct the exemptions you expect to have, multiply by the taxing authority millage rate and extend the amount. Then total it all up. IF the millage rate doesn't change much and IF the property appraiser doesn't arrive at a value higher than the purchase price, you should be able to get a pretty good estimate of your taxes. Or, if you can deal with a rougher estimate, just multiply the purchase price by the total millage rate (i.e. 1.6% or whatever) and use that as a rule of thumb.

[sware2cod]

Originally Posted by staywarm2

Thanks for the advice.

It looks like all I can get is what the previous owner paid (+/- Homestead deduction) in property tax. If that person had lived the the house many years, surely the reassessment for me would be a substantial amount more? Then the amount of property taxes would also be more. Unless there is a millage rate that I can use to "guestimate" what the tax would be, then using the present owner's tax bill would be good if they had owned the house only a couple of years, and maybe not even then. Before I buy a home out of state, I would want to have a reasonable guess of what my property tax bill would be before I made an offer and/or went to closing.

I have worked with agents in other states where they would quote a certain given percent that I could take times the purchase price I wanted to pay to get a reasonable guess of what the tax would be.

The property appraiser's web site lists the Total Appraised Value for the home as well as the Save Our Homes amount. Save Our Homes amt can be lower than the Appraised Value if the owner lived there for quite some time. This would be the "lower appraised amt" that they are paying taxes on.

When the property is sold to someone new to the area, the Save Our Homes savings/exemption for that house is wiped out. You then start accumulating a new Save Our Homes appraisal savings as you live there over time and the property value rises.(folks can move their Save Our Homes when they move , that's another complex calculation that you don't need to worry about now.)

To compare properties you are looking to buy, simply look at the Save Our Homes appraisal amt and do some math to instead used the total appraised value. If you plan to live in the home and file a homestead exemption, you would then file for it and get the homestead exemption(deduct 25k from the appraised amt for all taxes and an additional 25k all taxes but schools) to be deducted from the total appraised value.

Due to the downturn, many homes that were sold after approx 2002 (or so) will not have much difference (if any) between Save Our Homes appraised amt and Actual Appraised Amt. This will make calculations much easier for you for home sold in 2002 or later, as you will be paying pretty darn close to what they pay. The only difference being any reappraisal that is done each year and comes out approx July of each year on the Property Appraisers web site.

Seriously, each home is reevaluated with some computer calcs. My appraised amt has changed every year. It's gone down the past several years but went up drastically during the boom years.

A home that had NO homestead exemption will not have a Save Our Homes exemption or savings for the current owner...such as a rental home owned by an investor.

[staywarm2]

Thanks, sware2cod,

I'll use the advice you provided and access the property appraiser's website and try to figure this all out. Coming up with a general idea of what the property tax would be will be very helpful in aiding us in our decision of what price home we can afford in Sarasota Co. (Venice), given property tax and homeowners insurance, both of which are much higher than where we live now.

[sware2cod]

Originally Posted by staywarm2

Coming up with a general idea of what the property tax would be will be very helpful in aiding us in our decision of what price home we can afford in Sarasota Co. (Venice), given property tax and homeowners insurance, both of which are much higher than where we live now.

Be careful to check whether a particular property is within city limits(City of Venice, for example). There are additional city taxes for those city properties. There are properties with a Venice address that are inside or outside city limits. Generally, the Island is within city limits, plus some areas outside the island.

When I purchased, one of my requirements was to be outside city limits to help save a bit on the tax bill.