Posted on 09/22/2017 11:46:40 AM PDT by street_lawyer
About 40 years ago Florida allowed thousands of “inaccessible” lots to be platted, and are now being taxed, especially in Polk County. That is “inaccessible”, like in you can’t get to your property because it’s landlocked. IF you trespass you’ll find that it’s probably underwater, and if not, you can bet it’s “designated” as a “floodplain” and “wetlands”. All forms of wildlife will love you, but before you open your checkbook, be advised that you can’t even put up an American flag on a poll without spending well in excess of $100,000 and five years in order to obtain a denial. The denial is necessary before you hire a high-priced attorney to file suit in Federal Court; assuming you want the government to either stop taxing your property or pay you to take it off your hands. In all probability, you would be wasting your money since there is apparently nothing illegal about taxing you for property you can’t get to or use. Being the ethical person you are, you wouldn’t dream of selling the lot to another person who will never have the use and enjoyment of the property.
There are literally hundreds of lots all of which share the same impediments. These lots scream for a class action, and it would be especially nice for legal counsel since while the owner might get $300 the lawyer probably makes a thousand times that amount. Not likely to happen. It may take a constitutional amendment before Florida stops charging for doing nothing.
The power to tax is provided for in the Florida Constitution. A land tax (ad valorem) is based on the value that the tax collector put on the property. It is the price a willing and knowledgeable purchaser would pay for the lot. There’s the rub. For example, a one-acre lot is valued at $750 (just value) the owner pays taxes to the Board of County Commissioners, Parks Dpt., Library, Stormwater MSTU, School Boards state and local, and South Florida Water Management District. Total tax rate on the lot is 14.78200. Bear in mind that not only will no one ever live on the lot, so it’s not likely to impact the parks, library, or schools; and it is already underwater, but still paying fees to the South Florida Water Management District. Go Figure!
Can’t a person just let revert back to the state due to unpaid taxes? The land is unsellable and unusable. Can’t you just walk away?
I remember when we moved to a nice town in upstate New York back when I was a kid, in 1966. There was a real estate office on the main street of the town that sold Florida property.
I even remember the name: "Deltona Properties." It's logo was a stylized sunset.
The office was serious: a detached storefront building, with a sign that projected out over the sidewalk.
If they had sales offices in that little town, there must have been literally hundreds of others, if not thousands.
Deltona is real as is Cape Coral a place thats name was also plaster all over public transportation vehicles when I was a kid.
Wish I put 100 G’s into Cape Coral back then but didn’t have that $$ mowing lawns.
Practically all of Florida is an aquifer. So many places will be “swamps”. Quotations used because large developers have made it an art form to de-water areas to then develop them. But yeah, don’t buy swamp to start with unless you have the money to de-swamp it. I’ve seen smaller developers pile a bunch of waste brush and tree cuttings and sewage treatment soil onto a swamped lot until it’s raised up I’d say 8’. Six months later there’s a house on it with a for sale sign out front.
My brother and his wife married 50 years ago, Sept. 1967, and honeymooned in Miami Beach. They returned so excited because they bought a lot in Deltona for $1000. Unfortunately he passed away eight years later. His widow tried to sell it. She couldn’t find anyone to deal with.
Dennis Covington wrote a great book about his personal experience.
“Redneck Riviera: Armadillos, Outlaws, and the Demise of an American Dream.”
Same guy who wrote the book about the Alabama snake handlers.
Oh, and they also use large, reinforced concrete slabs for the houses on these reclaimed lots with light weight building materials so the houses aren’t susceptible to subsidence.
My house was built next to a swamp in 1985. It was built on #’ of fill piled on top of low ground next to a swamp. With 30+ years of oak leaves and grass mulching the land around the house came up about 1.5 feet. Now the swamp is filling in. In another 10 years I add 2.7 acres of reclaimed swamp to my property. Praise the septic tanks.
Wow, that's really something. I thought it was at least legit.
Maybe it's one of those things where there are good parcels and not-so-good parcels, and if you had strong real estate knowledge you could make out, but if you just went in and let the salesman sell you something for a retirement home off in the future, you could get rooked.
As CGASMIA68 implied, there were ways to come out on the plus side. For my part, I always thought that if I had followed my mother's advice when I was young and bought a little piece of land, I would have made a lot of money. Of course I didn't have any money back then either, or at least it seemed that way.
In the 60’s and 70’s, land in Florida was the TimeShare of the era. My in-laws bought a lot while they were on a Disney trip and paid taxes on it until they died. My wife dumped it for next to nothing.
Nowadays, people will give you a TimeShare to get rid of it.
BTW, $2/in2 is a bit more than $12.5 million/acre.
I always hear a commercial by a company that specializes in getting people out of TimeShares
what I didn’t put in my post is that the lot I was referring to is next to a bombing range used by the military for training with live munitions,
yeah a lot of people just stop paying the taxes, but I guess for $10/yr some people hold on hoping that someday it will be worth something.
I can recall all those ‘free chicken dinners’at the hotels during the 60s and 70s...(St.Louis airport area...).
when I was a preteen I paid a $1 for a postage stamp size lot in Arizona. Probably saw the add in a comic book. I don’t remember if I ever got a deed.
this sounds like the lot I bought when I was a preteen. I think I got a deal, because I only paid $1.
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