The Hurricane Tax Abatement – What you need to know!

During 2018, the Florida Legislature passed tax relief for certain homeowners who had property damaged in the last three hurricanes to hit Florida (Hermine and Matthew in 2016; Irma in 2017) (F. S. 197.318).

Who and What:
You may be entitled to a tax abatement (refund) if your house was damaged in one of the recent hurricanes and you were unable to live in your homestead residence for 30 or more days. Renters/rental property is not eligible for the tax refund.

Here's what YOU need to do:
If you were unable to live in your home for 30 or more days during 2017 due to the storms and flooding, fill out form DR-463. Send it to our office along with your documented loss. Documents include: utility bills, insurance information, contractor’s work, building permits, certificates of occupancy, rent payments, hotel bills etc. -- basically any information that allows us to determine that you were unable to occupy and use your home for 30 or more days. NOTE: the days DO NOT need to be consecutive.

Here's what WE will do:
We’ll look at your documentation to make sure that you qualify. If you qualify we’ll calculate your loss in value and send it to the Lee County Tax Collector (www.leetc.com). The Tax Collector will then figure out if you get a refund and how much (they have to check what you paid and when before they can determine if you get money back).

Deadline:
You MUST apply by March 1, 2019. DO NOT DELAY. If your application is not in our office by March 1, 2019, we CANNOT consider it. We will review all applications and make determinations by March 31, 2019. Once we make our determination, we will notify you by mail of our decision. If you don’t qualify and you think you should, you can appeal our decision to the Value Adjustment Board.

Questions:
Contact us via email to Taxroll@leepa.org. Call us at (239) 533-6100. Fax us at (239) 533-6160.

Dear Property Owner:

Recently in the news (Wink News and News-Press) you may have noticed we are still getting the word out to make sure that we’ve addressed everyone who had remaining damage from Hurricane Irma and the flooding. As you continue to recover from the impact of 2017’s weather events, we continue to work to ensure that we’ve identified and considered all the impacts those events had on your property. In just a few short weeks, we will be sending out your Notice of Proposed Property Taxes (TRIM notice). The value on your Notice reflects what our office believes your property to be worth on January 1, 2018.

Many of you have had storm and flooding damage; most damage has been repaired, some still remains. For those of you that let us know you had damage on January 1, your value will include consideration of that damage.

If you did not let us know your property had storm or flooding damage remaining on January 1, this is your last opportunity to let our office know so that we can ensure that your 2018 value reflects that damage. We encourage you to review your Notice and contact us with questions, including any about existing storm and flooding damage.

As I mentioned to you in my last letter (sent to over 14,000 of you), we have worked with the Florida Legislature and they passed tax relief for certain property owners that were displaced for more than 30 days during some of the previous storms. The relief will be in the form of a tax rebate. We are working out the details and in the near future we will post additional information on qualifications and the process.

If you need to contact us and provide us information or if you have any questions, please email us at Taxroll@leepa.org, call us at (239) 533-6100 or fax to (239) 533-6160, and we’ll be happy to assist you with the process.

Thank you for your continued cooperation and assistance as we move forward.

Respectfully,

Kenneth M. Wilkinson, CFA
Lee County Property Appraiser