Your Florida TRIM notice, explained

Every August, your county Property Appraiser mails every owner a Notice of Proposed Property Taxes — the TRIM notice ("Truth in Millage," Fla. Stat. §200.069). It is not a bill. It is the one document each year that shows what every taxing authority proposes to collect from you — and it starts the only clock you get for challenging your assessment. This year's notice also lands in the middle of the biggest Florida property-tax vote in decades: Amendment 3, covered below.

What it is — and what it isn't

The Property Appraiser mails the notice in the name of your taxing authorities (county, school board, city, districts) after the roll is certified in summer; the actual tax bill comes separately from the Tax Collector around November 1. Nothing on the TRIM notice is due. The mailing date printed on it matters more than any other line — the petition deadline below is counted from it.

The comparison that matters: three versions of "your taxes"

The statute forces the notice into an honest three-way comparison for each taxing authority:

• Your property taxes last year — what you actually paid each authority.
• Your taxes this year if NO budget change is adopted — this year's values at the rolled-back rate (§200.065): the millage that would raise the same total dollars as last year from the same properties (new construction excluded). This is the honest baseline.
• Your taxes this year if the PROPOSED budget change is adopted — what the authority actually intends to levy.

Here is the part Florida's TRIM law exists to make visible: when values rise, an unchanged millage rate collects more money. If the "proposed" column is higher than the "no budget change" column, that is a tax increase under Florida law — even when an official says "we held the rate steady." The rolled-back rate is the number that makes that claim checkable.

The three values on the notice

• Market (just) value — the Property Appraiser's January 1 valuation of the property.
• Assessed value — market value minus any accumulated cap savings: Save Our Homes limits homestead assessment growth (§193.155), and non-homestead property has its own 10 percent cap (§193.1554).
• Taxable value — assessed value minus your exemptions; what the millage is actually applied to. School and non-school taxable values can differ because some exemptions do not apply to school levies.

You can pull any parcel's certified values with the property tax lookup, see how your county's millage compares in the all-67 ranked county table, and check what the exemptions are worth with the homestead exemption calculator.

The 25-day deadline most people miss

Disagree with the value (or a denied exemption)? Florida gives you a short, hard window: a petition to the county's Value Adjustment Board may be filed "on or before the 25th day following the mailing of the notice" (§194.011(3)(d)). The clock runs from the mailing date printed on your TRIM notice — typically putting the deadline in early-to-mid September.

• Start with a phone call. Every Property Appraiser's office holds informal conferences; documentation errors (wrong square footage, ignored damage, a missed exemption) are often corrected without a petition.
• Then petition if needed — filed with the Value Adjustment Board clerk, listed on the notice itself.
• Know what the VAB can and cannot hear: it decides value and exemption disputes. It has no power over the tax rate.
• The rate is decided at the hearings on the notice. Each authority's budget hearing date, time, and location is printed right on the TRIM notice — that public hearing is where the millage is actually voted, and where residents get heard on it.

Amendment 3: the property-tax vote your notice arrives into

On June 2, 2026, the Florida Legislature passed HJR 1-F, placing Amendment 3 — "Save Our Homes From Excessive Property Taxes" — on the November 3, 2026 ballot. It needs at least 60 percent approval to pass. What it would do:

• Homestead exemption, non-school levies: a new exemption of $150,000 of assessed value in 2027, rising to $250,000 in 2028, indexed to inflation beginning 2029. School-district taxes are unaffected — you would keep paying school levies on today's basis.
• New Florida residents wait: owners establishing residency after January 1, 2027 get a $50,000 non-school exemption for their first five years before qualifying for the full amount.
• Non-homestead cap tightens: the annual assessment-increase cap on second homes, rentals, and commercial property drops from 10 percent to 5 percent (non-school levies) beginning 2027.
• The money question: state analyses project local revenue reductions of roughly $4.6 billion in the first year and $8.4 billion in the second, with recurring estimates near $12 billion once fully phased in. How counties, cities, and special districts absorb or replace that is the open question analysts on all sides flag — the amendment itself specifies no replacement.

What it does not change: anything on the notice in your hand. This year's TRIM notice and the bill that follows it are computed under current law; if Amendment 3 passes, its first effect would be the 2027 roll. Nothing about it changes the 25-day petition window or this year's hearings.

Buying a home? The seller's TRIM math is not yours

The values on a listing's TRIM notice carry the seller's Save Our Homes history — which dies at closing. Assessed value resets to market when you buy (§193.155), so your first full-year bill is computed from what you paid. The buyer property-tax calculator models that reset for your county, and the portability calculator computes what you can carry from a prior Florida homestead.

Sources

• Fla. Stat. §200.069 — the notice's required form; §200.065 — rolled-back rate and hearing process; §194.011 — the 25-day petition window.
• Florida Senate, June 2, 2026 — passage of HJR 1-F.
• Florida Policy Institute and Tax Foundation — Amendment 3 ballot language, figures, and fiscal analyses.

Planning figures and plain-language summaries — not legal or tax advice. Your county's notice, Property Appraiser, and Value Adjustment Board control.