Homebuyers who fled to Florida to escape high taxes are now shocked at their massive tax bills

Eugene Bednarski didn't think twice about paying his property taxes to Pasco County, Florida, which is on the western coast of the state.

There was a surprise in the mail in May when a new bill showed the tax obligation on the house was more than before.

The new bill was a mistake after Bednarski was shocked. The government believed the property was eligible for a higher assessment because it had traded hands. The change in the home's title was caused by his divorce and not a sale.

Bednarski told Insider that he would have been flirting with thousands of dollars a year.

Many people in Florida will not be so lucky.

People who moved to Florida over the past couple of years to escape high taxes in other states are upset by the rising property taxes in the state. Most will fight their local governments over the bigger bills. Some people have regretted moving in the first place because of the unexpected costs, while others plan to leave the state.

Next year, anyone who bought a Florida property in 2022 will be in the same position.

First-time homebuyers and people who move from another state are the main causes of property tax increases. There is a state constitutional amendment from the 1990s called Save Our Homes that caps local property taxes for existing homeowners at 3% per year. Existing Florida homeowners who move to a new primary residence in the state are subject to the cap.

Residents and experts familiar with the law say the measure was to make living in Florida affordable.

According to data from the Florida Department of Revenue, the share of tax dollars that have been exempt from a non-capped increase has declined over the past three years.

People are moaning about tax bills they didn't expect

There is outrage over the tax bills.

Robert Walsh's taxes for a duplex in Fort Lauderdale went from $5,000 a year to $13,000 a year.

One member of the 13,500-member Facebook group for people moving out of Florida claimed his property taxes went from $3,800 to $8,200. He was considering putting his house up for sale if he couldn't get his taxes lowered.

If people don't research the costs of owning a home in Florida, they'll end up regretting it.

Simmons said that it can be a stark difference from someone's tax bill who just sold to a new buyer. It would change the needle on whether they would have purchased or not.

Corporate homebuyers are also getting hit with higher tax bills

Large-scale home buyers are getting caught off guard.

Invitation Homes, which owns more than 80,000 single-family rentals nationwide, last month said its tax bills could rise as much as 8% in 2022, about 3 percentage points more than it expected, according to a Seeking Alpha transcript of the company's third-quarter- earnings call.

On the call, Invitation Home's chief financial officer said that assessments in Florida and Georgia rose 30% on average.

"Especially in those two states, we're going to appeal more than we've ever done before."

Texas saw increased demand for housing during the Pandemic as big investors worried about their investments.

After hearing "surprising and disappointing news" about its obligations, the chief financial officer of American Homes 4 Rent projected that the company's property taxes in the Lone Star State would go up by more than 20%.

The bills went up even after Texas passed legislation to cap property-tax revenue growth.

The Texas Tribune reported that some local governments in Texas want to raise property taxes to pay for relief from hurricanes.