I received a question today, that my answer could be informative for potential purchasers of Naples FL real estate. 

I have another question for you. A friend of mine living in Florida, told me the way to figure out how much you’ll be paying in taxes is, it’s $12.00 per $1,000 in Florida. Is this true for all of Florida or just certain parts? Also how much is it per $1,000 in Naples?

First, let’s look at how real estate taxes are calculated.
 
Taxable value x tax rate = annual real estate taxes.
 
Every year all the county appraisers throughout the state of Florida reassess properties as of January 1st, based upon market activity in the preceding calendar year.  The reassessment gives us what is termed market assessed value.  The market assessed value can be reduced by the Save Our Homes exemption (homesteaded properties can only increase a maximum of 3% of the previous year’s assessed value) and the homestead exemption.  The resulting figure is called taxable assessed value.
 
There is no overall Florida real estate tax rate.  Each county determines their tax rate based upon what is budgeted to run the county and/or city governments, schools, fire districts, etc.  Within each county there are what is called Millage Areas or tax rate areas.  In Collier County the Naples area there are over 280 such areas.  The range of tax rates runs from a low of $10.8694 per $1,000 up to a maximum of $16.1439 per $1,000.  The average for the Naples area is $12.48626 per $1,000 and median is $12.4374.
 
Generally, we use the formula of 80% of the purchase price x 1.25% or 1% of the purchase price.  For example, a purchase price of $200,000 would yield $2,000 per year for real estate taxes annually.
 
Due to how the assessed value works, it becomes very important for you as potential purchaser of real estate to work with a real estate professional that can use available information to inform you of what real estate taxes could be on a property given the existing tax rate as well as determining what the appropriate taxable assessed value for the proposed purchase.

Please be aware that the tax rates and method of estimating real estate taxes will be significantly different if you are considering purchasing in the Bonita Springs FL real estate or Estero FL real estate markets.

Often people want to know from a real estate agent’s point of view where they should consider buying a condo.  Recently, a few people asked about some three different bundled golf course communities. 

Looking at closed sales for the past six months and the previous six months the results for the average price paid was rather interesting to see how the values were affected by the recent downturn in the real estate market.

The loss in value revealed greatly different results – in community number 1 - the values fell less than 2%, community number 2 – values dipped about 15%, while community number 3 – values fell about 22%.

What proved interesting is that community number 3 was an older community built during the late 80′s.  This was expected since, newer constructed properties tend to appreciate faster and fall in value more slowly.  This does affect either community numbers 1 or 2, they were built and completed most recently.  What may have been the cause of the variation in reduced value, may have been simply the locations within the Naples area.

This is a good example of how segmented a local real estate market can be and is worth a buyer’s time to identify communities meeting their needs and gaining an understanding of historical values.  The in-depth analysis does take some time to assemble.

Today, Jim Messenger found an interesting and somewhat misleading article about real estate agents representing buyers.

Personally, I found the author of the article rather misinformed or not doing sufficient research to realize that various states have different laws governing real estate brokerage and do vary from state to state.

If you are a buyer of real estate, one of the first questions you should ask the real estate agent or REALTOR is “Could you please tell me about real estate brokerage agency in your state?”  and then “How will you represent me in the real estate transaction?”

Know how a real estate agent or real estate brokerage is going to represent you is very important.