South Florida real estate questions, answered

Under the Florida Realtors/Florida Bar AS IS contract, the seller has no repair budget and the buyer can cancel for any reason during the inspection period (15 days if the blank is left empty) and get the deposit back.

In the Florida Realtors/Florida Bar residential contracts, the inspection period is the number of days the parties write in, or 15 days after the Effective Date if the blank is left empty.

Florida law does not set an earnest-money amount; the deposit is negotiated, and the Florida Realtors/Florida Bar contracts require the initial deposit within 3 days after the Effective Date if no other timing is filled in.

In Florida, who pays for the owner's title insurance policy is negotiable and is chosen by checkbox in the purchase contract: the seller pays, the buyer pays, or, under the Miami-Dade/Broward regional option, the buyer pays for the owner's policy and chooses the closing agent while the seller covers limited title-search costs.

Under the Florida Realtors/Florida Bar contracts, the buyer pays loan-related costs, including Florida's documentary stamp tax on the mortgage (35 cents per $100 borrowed) and the intangible tax (2 mills, or $2 per $1,000 borrowed), plus recording fees, appraisal, inspections, insurance and any title costs the contract assigns to the buyer.

The Florida Realtors/Florida Bar contracts have no default closing date, so the closing date is whatever the buyer and seller write in, and the timeline is driven by the contract's deadlines.

Florida does not require buyers to hire their own attorney, and closings can be handled by a licensed title insurance agency or by a Florida attorney acting as closing agent.

Before you wire a deposit or closing funds, confirm the wiring instructions by calling your closing agent at a phone number you already know, never one taken from the email or text that sent the instructions.

When you buy a one- or two-family home from a Florida builder that sells or builds 10 or more units a year, state law gives you the right to have deposits of up to 10% of the price held in escrow unless you waive it in writing, and the contract must say so in conspicuous type.

File with the property appraiser in the county where the home is located (online, in person or by mail) by March 1 of the tax year, and you must own the home and make it your permanent residence on January 1 of that year.

For the 2026 tax year, a Florida homestead receives a $25,000 exemption that applies to all property taxes, including school taxes, plus an additional exemption of up to $26,411 that applies only to non-school taxes on assessed value above $50,000.

When a Florida home sells, the property appraiser reassesses it at full market (just) value as of January 1 of the following year, so the seller's homestead exemption and Save Our Homes cap disappear and your bill reflects the new value.

Do not use the seller's tax bill; instead, start from the value the home is likely to be assessed at after your purchase, subtract the exemptions you will qualify for, and multiply by the combined millage rate for that exact address (one mill is $1 per $1,000 of taxable value).

Save Our Homes limits how much the assessed value of a homesteaded Florida home can rise each year to 3% or the change in the Consumer Price Index, whichever is lower, which is 2.7% for 2026.

Portability lets you transfer up to $500,000 of your accumulated Save Our Homes benefit (the gap between your old Florida homestead's market value and its capped assessed value) to a new Florida homestead.

Only in narrow cases: Florida law treats renting all or substantially all of a homestead as abandoning it, though a rental that begins after January 1 does not cost you that year's exemption unless the home is rented more than 30 days per calendar year for two consecutive years.

Florida property tax bills go out around November 1 and can be paid through March 31, with discounts of 4% in November, 3% in December, 2% in January and 1% in February.

Yes, but it is income-limited and set locally: Florida lets counties and cities grant an extra homestead exemption of up to $50,000 to owners 65 and older whose household income is under a cap, which was $38,686 for the 2026 exemption.

No: a married couple gets one Florida homestead exemption between them, and you cannot receive it while either spouse claims a residency-based exemption or tax credit on another home, whether in Florida or another state.

Zones that start with A or V, such as AE and VE, are FEMA's high-risk Special Flood Hazard Areas, where flood insurance is required if you have a federally backed mortgage, and V zones add the hazard of coastal storm waves.

Search the address in FEMA's Flood Map Service Center, the official public source for NFIP flood maps, or use the flood zone lookup tool your county or city provides.

Federal law requires flood insurance when a federally regulated or federally backed lender makes, increases, extends or renews a loan on a building in a FEMA Special Flood Hazard Area (an A or V zone) in a community that participates in the NFIP.

Yes, Florida law requires Citizens to make most Personal Residential policyholders with wind coverage carry flood insurance, and the phase-in reaches all such policies effective on or after January 1, 2027.

Either can satisfy a mortgage requirement, because lenders must accept a private flood policy that meets federal standards, so the choice comes down to limits, deductibles, exclusions, price and how long you plan to keep the coverage.

Risk Rating 2.0 is the NFIP's pricing method for new policies since October 1, 2021 and for all renewals since April 1, 2022, and it rates each building on its own flood frequency, flood types, distance to water, first floor height and cost to rebuild rather than mainly on its flood zone.

Most homeowners do not need an elevation certificate to buy NFIP flood insurance, but owners in high-risk A and V zones may need one, and a certificate can document features that qualify for discounts.

Under section 689.302, Florida Statutes, a seller of residential real property must complete a written flood disclosure and give it to the buyer at or before the time the sales contract is signed.

Yes, an NFIP flood policy on a building can be assigned to the buyer in writing when title transfers, which may let the buyer keep the seller's current rate and its capped annual increases instead of starting at the full-risk rate.

Federal law does not require flood insurance in Zone X, but a lender can still require it, and most Citizens policyholders with wind coverage must carry it under a phase-in that reaches all remaining policies effective on or after January 1, 2027.

West Boca is not part of the City of Boca Raton: it is unincorporated Palm Beach County, and the City says the "Boca Raton" in those addresses is used for mailing purposes.

Based on Census Bureau 2020 boundary data, only three ZIP codes used for Boca Raton addresses, 33431, 33432 and 33486, lie entirely inside the City of Boca Raton.

To park inside Boca Raton's city beach parks you need an Annual Beach Vehicle Entry Permit or a daily entrance, and which annual permit you can buy depends on where you live.

The Greater Boca Raton Beach & Park District is a separate special taxing district, created by a 1974 special act of the Florida Legislature, that covers all of the City of Boca Raton plus land east of the Florida Turnpike and south of Clint Moore Road.

Inside the City of Boca Raton you pay the City's millage (3.6476 operating plus 0.0173 debt service for tax year 2025) and a separate City fire assessment fee, while unincorporated West Boca owners pay no City millage but do pay Palm Beach County's Fire/Rescue levy (3.4581 mills) and county library levy (0.5491 mills).

Public school assignment for a Boca Raton address is set by the School District of Palm Beach County's attendance zones, which you can check with the District's Find My Zoned School tool or its elementary, middle and high school attendance zone maps.

Most renovation work in Boca Raton needs a building permit, because Florida law makes it unlawful to construct, alter, repair or demolish a building without a permit from the local enforcing agency: the City's Building Division inside city limits, or Palm Beach County's Permit Center in unincorporated West Boca.

Yes: the City of Boca Raton participates in FEMA's Community Rating System, and the City says its improved classification qualifies residents for a 25% discount on qualifying National Flood Insurance Program policies in all flood zones starting in October 2025, up from 15%.

Yes, Brightline opened its Boca Raton station at 101 NW 4th Street, next to the downtown library and across from Mizner Park, with the first day of service on December 21, 2022.

"No fixed bridges" means a boat can travel from the property's dock to the ocean without passing under any bridge that cannot open, because every bridge on the route is a drawbridge that raises for boats.

Official clearance figures are in NOAA's Coast Pilot 4 (Chapter 12 covers the Intracoastal Waterway) and on NOAA nautical charts, which give each bridge's vertical clearance in feet above mean high water, while drawbridge opening times are set by federal rule 33 CFR 117.261.

Boca Raton Inlet connects Lake Boca Raton to the Atlantic, and Hillsboro Inlet, about 5 miles to the south near Hillsboro Inlet Light, connects the Hillsboro River and the Intracoastal Waterway to the ocean on the Broward side.

Official sources such as NOAA charts and the Coast Pilot focus on main navigation channels rather than the canal behind a particular house, so a dependable check is a recent depth survey of the dock area, the canal and the canal mouth, measured at low tide against a stated datum.

The owner of the property where a seawall sits is generally responsible for keeping it in good repair, and Broward County's code states that all property owners must maintain a tidal flood barrier in good repair and makes failure to do so a citable offense.

As of 2026, Broward County's tidal flood barrier standard requires new seawalls, and seawalls undergoing substantial repair, to have a minimum elevation of 5 feet NAVD88, although applications submitted before January 1, 2035 may be permitted at 4 feet NAVD88 if the wall is designed to reach 5 feet by January 1, 2050.

Yes: plan on a building permit from your city (or the county building division in unincorporated areas) plus environmental approval, or a documented exemption, from the Florida Department of Environmental Protection and, depending on the waterway and county, the Army Corps of Engineers and Broward County's environmental licensing program.

Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) rules set manatee speed zones on the Intracoastal and connected waters: in Broward, the Intracoastal is generally a maximum 25 mph zone with slow speed within 50 feet of shore unless a stricter zone applies, and in Boca Raton the stretch from the Palmetto Park Road bridge to the Camino Real bridge, including all of Lake Boca Raton, is slow speed year-round.

Under Section 253.141, Florida Statutes, riparian rights are the rights of an owner whose land borders navigable water, including ingress, egress, boating, bathing and fishing, and they pass automatically with the land even if the deed does not mention them.

Intracoastal frontage sits on the federally maintained Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway, canal frontage sits on a side canal that connects to it, and lake frontage can mean either a tidal lake on the Intracoastal, such as Lake Boca Raton, or an isolated lake with no boat route to the ocean.

In Florida, a transaction broker gives limited representation to a buyer, a seller, or both, without acting as a fiduciary for either one, and state law presumes every licensee is a transaction broker unless a single agent or no brokerage relationship is set up in writing.

Only in a limited way: Florida prohibits dual agency, so one licensee can assist both the buyer and the seller only as a transaction broker, without fiduciary duties to either side.

If you are working with an agent who is an MLS participant, yes: since August 17, 2024, the NAR settlement practice changes require a written agreement before that agent tours a home with you, in person or by live virtual tour.

You are responsible for paying your agent what your written buyer agreement says, but you can still ask the seller or the listing brokerage to pay some or all of it as part of your offer.

Use the free licensee search on the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation (DBPR) website, myfloridalicense.com, and search by name or license number under the Real Estate board.

A Florida sales associate and a broker associate both work under the direction of an employing broker; the difference is that a broker associate has qualified for a broker license but chooses to operate as a sales associate for another broker.

A real estate agent is anyone licensed by the state to help people buy, sell or rent property; in Florida that means a sales associate, broker associate or broker licensed through DBPR.

A comparative market analysis (CMA) is a real estate licensee's opinion of a home's likely market value based on comparable properties, while an appraisal is a service that only state-certified, licensed or registered trainee appraisers provide.

Florida property appraisers estimate just value as of January 1 each year using mass appraisal of the prior year's qualified sales, with a statutory deduction for costs of sale, so their figure lags the market and is not a price opinion on your specific home.

A low appraisal does not automatically cancel a Florida purchase, but it can change your loan offer because the appraisal is the lender's independent estimate of the home's market value.