Living here

Property taxes and the homestead exemption in Boca Raton

Published October 2026

Three offices share the job and most confusion comes from asking the wrong one. Who values your home, who sends the bill, the March 1 homestead deadline — and Amendment 3, on the November 2026 ballot.

A tile-roofed house among tall palms across a wide street in Boca Raton — Boca Raton · Houses and palmsBoca Home by pasa47, CC BY 2.0

A property tax bill in Boca Raton comes from one office, is based on a value set by a second, and is made up of rates set by several others. Almost every frustrating phone call about it is a call to the wrong one.

Who does what

	What they do	When you hear from them
Property Appraiser	Values every property as of January 1, and grants exemptions such as homestead	The proposed-taxes (TRIM) notice in mid-August
Taxing authorities	The city, the county, the school district and other districts each set their own rate	Budget hearings listed on the TRIM notice
Tax Collector	Sends the bill and takes the payment	Bills go out by November 1

So: if you think your value is wrong, or your exemption is missing, it is the Property Appraiser. If you want to pay, or a payment is missing, it is the Tax Collector. If you think the rate is too high, the TRIM notice tells you when each body holds its public hearing — that is the moment to say so.

Inside the city limits your bill carries the City of Boca Raton's own levy; in unincorporated Boca it does not. If you are not sure which side you are on, which Boca Raton are you in? settles it.

Paying the bill

Taxes for a year can be paid from November 1 to March 31. Paying early earns a discount that is largest in November and shrinks each month to nothing in March; the bill becomes delinquent on April 1, when penalties start and online payment stops. A deadline that lands on a weekend or holiday moves to the next business day. The Tax Collector also runs an installment plan; as of October 2026, sign-up for a year's taxes closes on April 30 of that year.

The bill goes to the address the Property Appraiser holds. If you have moved and the bill has not followed you, fix the address there, not at the Tax Collector.

Homestead: the deadline that costs people money

If you own your home and it is your permanent residence, you can claim the homestead exemption. The rules that matter:

You must qualify on January 1 — be a permanent Florida resident, hold title, live there, and claim no residency-based tax benefit anywhere else.
You must file by March 1 of the year you want it. Florida law treats a missed deadline as giving up the exemption for that year.
It does not follow you to a new home. Buy another house and you file again.

How to file. Online through the Property Appraiser's e-file, in person at one of its five service centers, or by mail on the state form, DR-501. The nearest to Boca is in Delray Beach, at 14925 Cumberland Drive — the Property Appraiser calls it the South County center.

What to bring. Social Security numbers for every owner applying and their spouses; a Florida driver's license or Florida ID; proof of permanent residency if you are not a U.S. citizen; and one more document tying you to the address — a Florida vehicle or voter registration, a declaration of domicile, a federal tax return, or utility bills for the property.

After that it renews itself. A pink-and-white receipt card arrives at the end of December each year. If the property is sold, if you marry, divorce or an owner dies, or if the use of the home changes, tell the Property Appraiser — on 561-355-2866 — rather than waiting for it to find out.

What the exemption does

The amounts are on the Property Appraiser's page and change with inflation, so here is the shape:

A first exemption comes off your assessed value for every tax on the bill, school taxes included.
A second, additional exemption applies once your assessed value is above a threshold. It rises each year with inflation, does not reduce school taxes, and is applied automatically.
The Save Our Homes cap. Once you have homestead, the yearly rise in your assessed value is capped at 3% or at inflation as measured by the Consumer Price Index — the lower of the two. The cap resets when the home is sold.

That cap is why two identical houses on the same street can have very different bills: one has been homesteaded for twenty years and the other was bought last spring.

If you move within Florida: portability

The difference the cap has built up on your old home can come with you. You have until January 1 of the third year after leaving the old homestead to establish the new one, and you file for portability by March 1, normally on the same application as the new homestead. The Property Appraiser does the arithmetic.

Homes that are not homesteaded

Second homes, rentals and commercial property get a different cap: the assessed value cannot rise more than 10% a year for non-school taxes. It is applied automatically and ends when the property changes hands.

Seniors on a limited income

The county offers an additional exemption for homeowners 65 and over whose household income is under a limit set each year by the state, and some cities add their own on top. As of October 2026 the City of Boca Raton is not on the Property Appraiser's list of cities that do, so in the city the extra senior exemption applies to the county's taxes only. The form is DR-501SC, due by March 1.

Amendment 3, on the November 2026 ballot

As of October 2026, a proposed change to the Florida Constitution is on the November 2026 general election ballot as Amendment 3. According to the Florida Department of State's summary, it would:

make the homestead exemption larger on every tax except school taxes — once in 2027, again in 2028, then rising with inflation;
have the Legislature set out a way for counties and cities to raise the exemption further, as far as the full assessed value;
for anyone who has not become a Florida resident by December 31, 2026, start them on today's exemption and phase in the larger one from their fifth year of exemption;
cut the cap on non-homestead assessment increases from 10% to 5%;
limit what counties and cities may spend property tax on.

If approved, it takes effect January 1, 2027. It changes nothing on the bill you receive this November. The Department of State's page has the full text, and the Property Appraiser has published a calculator for it. This site takes no position on how to vote.

What this page will not tell you

The tax rates. Every authority sets its own each year, and the city's budget office publishes a plain-language brochure, Property Taxes Explained, linked from its page. Your own TRIM notice lists every rate that applies to your property and what each one costs you.

Where this comes from

Checked against these on 2026-10-09. Fees, deadlines and portals change — if one of these pages disagrees with this one, the official page is right and we would like to know.

Revision history

October 2026 — First published.

We record when a guide was published and when it was last revised. We do not yet record what changed, so this is a dating record rather than a changelog.