Property Tax Alert: Florida

May 2005

In determining whether an apartment complex met a percentage-of-units threshold for a Florida property tax exemption for low-income housing, units that were not occupied on January 1 could not be included in the exempt unit category. The apartments had been previously occupied, but the language of the exemption statute did not expressly grant the exemption to units that were vacant on that date.

The vacant units did not qualify because (1) vacant units do not provide housing to anyone; (2) the legislature could have made that distinction, but had not; and (3) there was no evidence that the vacant units would necessarily be made available to low or very low income tenants. While a land use restriction agreement between the apartment complex and a county housing authority and a state administrative regulation encompassed vacant units within their exemption language, the relevant standard was that of the Department of Revenue, which was charged with overseeing the assessment of ad valorem taxes.

Please contact Rash & Associates for more information.