The average Brevard County property owner this fall may be paying almost 8 percent less in property taxes to the county compared to last year, County Manager Frank Abbate has projected.
Abbate’s recent report to the County Commission is based partly on countywide homes and businesses seeing an almost 8 percent increase in their taxable property values in the same time period.
“The county has seen almost $800 million in new construction this year,” county Property Appraiser Dana Blickley said last week. “And then there are new sales. That’s a large amount of capital coming on (tax rolls) this year.”
As existing properties increase in their value, and new properties are added, the Brevard County Charter requires a corresponding decrease in the actual tax rate of the properties in order to avoid an increase, Abbate says.
In fact, Blickley’s staff calculates countywide new and existing properties to be worth $40.6 billion this year for taxes, a 7.8 percent increase from last year’s $37.7 billion value.
Blickley pointed to the county’s increased involvement in the commercial space industry, such as the merger of the Melbourne-based Harris Corp. with New York’s L3 Technologies Inc., as the main reason for the boost in property values.
“We’re not just a county that sends up rockets anymore,” Blickley said.
But it’s not just about space. She pointed to the city of Cocoa as being the “winner” this year, with the county’s largest increase in property values – 12.6 percent – from $971 million last year to more than $1 billion now.
And most of that, Blickley said, was one project, a $145 million distribution center for frozen foods off State Road 524. At 555,000 square feet, with more than 400 employees, it opened last August and joined the tax rolls for the first time this year.
Among the cities and towns in the South Beaches, such an economic shot in the arm is rare.
“On the beach, those cities are pretty much built out,” Blickley said, adding that increases in beachside property values are primarily based on existing properties being repurposed and remodeled or just revalued.
But wait! That’s not the end of the story, because there are exceptions. Indian Harbor Beach saw a 6.9 percent increase in its taxable property value, from $904.9 million last year to $967.4 million now, largely based on $6.6 million in new construction. And some of that is from the 13-lot neighborhood The Enclave.
“Some of those homes went on (tax rolls) for 2019,” said Sarah Altman, Bleckley’s tax-roll manager. “The others will go on for 2020.”
Speaking of the future, Satellite Beach is waiting for the 108-unit Oceana Oceanfront Condominiums to join the tax rolls in 2020. Those units are priced in the $544,900 to $850,000 range. They should boost Satellite Beach’s value beyond its current $971 million mark. But it’s too early to guess how much, Altman said.
“I have no way to indicate what Oceana condos will be valued at this far in advance,” she said. “We will probably not have an intelligent number until next April or May.”
