Florida's tax deed timeline under Chapter 197: delinquent April 1, a tax certificate sale by June 1, a 2-year wait, then notice and a clerk's auction.
By InTym Properties
In Florida, the county doesn't foreclose on your house for unpaid property taxes the way a lender forecloses a mortgage. Instead, the tax collector sells a tax certificate to an investor, and that certificate holder can apply for a tax deed once two years have passed since April 1 of the year the certificate was issued (Fla. Stat. § 197.502). From the first missed November payment to a clerk's auction, the minimum runway is roughly 30 months. The whole process runs under Chapter 197 of the Florida Statutes, and you can stop it at any point by paying what's owed, right up until the tax deed is actually issued (§ 197.472).
Here's how the clock runs.
November 1: taxes come due. Property taxes for the year are payable starting November 1, with early-payment discounts through the winter months. Whatever remains unpaid becomes delinquent on April 1 of the following year (§ 197.333).
April 1: delinquency, and the meter starts. Delinquent real estate taxes accrue interest at 18 percent per year until a certificate is sold, with a 3 percent minimum charge (§ 197.172). The tax collector must send you an additional notice by April 30 warning that a certificate may be sold (§ 197.343).
On or before June 1: the tax certificate sale. The tax collector advertises the delinquent properties once a week for 3 weeks and sells a certificate on each one, online in most counties including Broward (§§ 197.402, 197.432). Bidders compete on the interest rate, starting at the 18 percent statutory maximum and bidding down. If you pay everything owed before your certificate is issued, it never exists (§ 197.432(3)). If no investor bids, the certificate is struck to the county.
The next two years: quiet but expensive. Nothing visible happens, but interest is compounding against you. You can redeem the certificate at any time by paying the face amount plus all accrued interest and costs, and most certificates carry a mandatory 5 percent minimum interest charge (§ 197.472). Every month you wait, the payoff grows.
Two years after April 1 of the issuance year: the tax deed application window opens. Under § 197.502, the certificate holder can file the certificate plus a tax deed application with the tax collector, pay a $75 application fee, and pay off every other outstanding certificate on the property. If the certificate is county-held and the property is assessed at $5,000 or more, the county is required to apply for the deed itself (§ 197.502(3)).
Notice, then the auction. Once the application is in, the clerk of court publishes a notice once a week for 4 consecutive weeks, and no sale can happen until at least 30 days after the first publication (§ 197.512). The clerk also mails certified notice to the owner and everyone with a recorded interest at least 20 days before the sale, and the sheriff attempts personal notice on the titleholder (§ 197.522). This is the letter with the all-caps warning that the property will be sold at public auction on a stated date.
The auction (§ 197.542). The clerk sells the property to the highest bidder. The opening bid is everything required to redeem the certificates, plus the applicant's costs and interest at 1.5 percent per month. One catch for homesteaded homes: the opening bid must also include half the property's assessed value, so homestead property rarely sells cheap, but it still sells.
After the hammer falls. Redemption is over. Section 197.472 lets you redeem only before the deed is issued. If the winning bid exceeded the opening bid, the surplus goes first to recorded liens, then to the former owner, who must file a claim with the clerk within 120 days of the surplus notice (§ 197.582).
Miss the November 2025 tax bill on a Fort Lauderdale home. It goes delinquent April 1, 2026. Broward County sells a certificate at its online sale in late May or June 2026. The earliest the certificate holder can apply for a tax deed is April 1, 2028. Add the publication and notice period, and the auction lands in late spring or summer of 2028.
That's roughly two and a half to three years from the missed payment, but nothing forces an investor to wait longer than the 2-year statutory minimum. On a property with real value, expect the application to come close to the first eligible date.
Pay it off or redeem. Until the certificate sells, you pay the tax collector directly. After it sells, you redeem through the tax collector under § 197.472: face amount plus interest and costs. For upcoming years, the tax collector's installment program (§ 197.222) spreads payments quarterly so a single November bill doesn't become a crisis again.
Negotiate the underlying problem. If the delinquency is tangled up with other debt, code fines, an IRS lien, a second mortgage, the property taxes are one line on a longer list. Our guide to selling a house with liens explains how liens get paid at closing, and the Broward-specific version covers the county's lien search process.
Sell before the auction. You own the property until the tax deed is issued, which means you can sell it the whole time. At closing, the title company pays the tax collector everything owed out of the proceeds, the certificate is redeemed, and the remaining equity is yours. That last part is the point: a tax deed auction starts at the debt amount, while a voluntary sale captures the difference between market value and the payoff.
A cash buyer is often the practical choice here because the timeline is short and the title is messy: no financing contingency, no appraisal, closing in weeks instead of months. Our we buy houses page covers what we purchase, the Fort Lauderdale city page has Broward-specific numbers, and the post on how fast a cash sale can close shows what the schedule actually looks like when a deadline is fixed.
If the auction already happened, claim the surplus. If the property sold for more than the opening bid, the difference is sitting with the clerk. File the claim form within the 120-day window under § 197.582, and be skeptical of third-party "surplus recovery" companies that take a large cut for filing paperwork you can file yourself.
Florida gives you more time than most people think, about two and a half years minimum from a missed payment to a tax deed auction, but the cost of waiting compounds at up to 18 percent a year and the cutoff is absolute. The homeowners who lose the most are the ones who let the certificate sit until an investor files for the deed. The ones who keep their equity are the ones who redeem, negotiate, or sell while they still hold the title.
Behind on property taxes in Broward County and a certificate's already been sold on your house? Call or text (650) 540-1854. InTym Properties can tell you what a payoff looks like, and if selling makes more sense, you'll have a written offer usually within 48 hours.
In Florida, the minimum runway is about two and a half years from the first missed payment. Taxes go delinquent April 1, a tax certificate sells on or before June 1, and under Fla. Stat. § 197.502 the certificate holder can apply for a tax deed only after 2 years have elapsed since that April 1.
No. In Florida, the right to redeem ends once the tax deed is issued to the buyer (Fla. Stat. § 197.472). If the auction price exceeded the opening bid, the former owner can file a claim for the surplus proceeds, which the clerk holds and disburses under § 197.582, but the property itself is gone.
In Florida, when property taxes go unpaid past April 1, the county tax collector auctions a tax certificate on the property on or before June 1 (Fla. Stat. §§ 197.402, 197.432). The investor who buys it pays your delinquent taxes and earns interest, up to 18 percent per year, until you redeem it.
No. In Florida, homestead shields a primary residence from most creditors, but not from unpaid property taxes. Homestead status only raises the opening bid at the tax deed auction: under Fla. Stat. § 197.542 it must include an amount equal to one-half of the property's assessed value.
Written offer usually within 48 hours, signed by the InTym Properties founder, every number shown. No repairs, no fees, no obligation.
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