Save Our Homes needs context before you estimate a tax bill

Save Our Homes can be a real Florida benefit, especially if you stay in the same homestead for a while.

After a home has homestead exemption, Florida’s Save Our Homes limit usually keeps the assessed value from rising by more than the lower of 3 percent or the CPI change for that year. Florida Revenue lists the 2026 cap at 2.7 percent. That limit is about assessed value, not the whole bill.

The easy misunderstanding is thinking the whole tax bill is frozen. It is not. Millage, school taxes, special districts, CDD lines, exemptions, and local assessments can still move the final number.

That does not make the cap small. It just means the cap is one piece of the math. It can help explain why two nearby homes have different taxable values, especially if one owner has had homestead for years.

Use Save Our Homes as one clue. Then look up the county property appraiser record and the tax collector bill before you trust an estimate. A capped value is helpful. The full bill tells the rest.