DeSantis wants to ban property taxes in Florida

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said that he wants to eliminate property taxes in the state.

In a post on X, the governor said that taxing land/property “is the more oppressive and ineffective” form of taxation.

“Property taxes are local, not state. So we’d need to do a constitutional amendment (requires 60% of voters to approve) to eliminate them (which I would support) or even to reform/lower them… We should put the boldest amendment on the ballot that has a chance of getting that 60%… “

Though Florida’s statewide budget mostly comes from the sales tax, property taxes fund critical services like police, fire and schools.

Amir Neto, the Florida Gulf Coast University Director of the Original Economic Research Institute, told ABC Action News that if the source of revenue is lost, you “either have to stop spending the money right, or you need to make up that revenue with something else.”

According to CoreLogic data, the median 2024 property tax in Florida was $3,101, a 9.5% increase over the prior year and up 47.5% from 2019. Property taxes have skyrocketed in South Florida in particular. Median property tax payments in Miami-Dade County have risen 56.8% since 2019, and they’ve jumped 56.8% in neighboring Broward County. Home-price appreciation over that period has been 58.9% and 59.9%, respectively.

Even in the last year, taxes have exploded for South Florida residents, as Broward experienced an 11.4% year-over-year jump in median property taxes and Miami-Dade’s rose by 9.9%.

Nationally, the highest effective property tax rates in 2023 were in Northeast and Midwest states, led by Illinois (1.88%), New Jersey (1.64%), Connecticut (1.54%), New York (1.46%) and Nebraska (1.46%), ATTOM reported.

Northeast states had seven of the 10 highest average property taxes in 2023, Attom reported. New Jersey led the way at $9,488, which was nearly 10 times the average of $989 in West Virginia, the state with the nation’s smallest average levy.

Because of its revenues from tourism, Florida does not have an income tax. Following several expensive hurricanes in recent years, Florida home insurance rates among the highest in the nation. According to Insurify, home insurance premiums rose about 7% in 2024 and are expected to keep rising.