Street Economics

Hollywood, Florida

HJR 1 Homestead-Exemption Tax-Base Exposure

Broward County . 2025 final assessment roll

Snapshot

The Hollywood read

Hollywood carries the Bedroom Residential Monoculture archetype, which describes a base built predominantly on owner-occupied single-family housing at moderate value with thin commercial, industrial, or rental property. That profile is the maximum-exposure archetype in theory: almost every dollar of value is the exact kind of property the amendment exempts, and stripping the homesteads leaves little taxable base behind. Yet Hollywood’s actual exposure reads at 16.9% at the full $250,000 phase-in in 2028 and 10.2% at the $150,000 step in 2027, placing it in the Low exposure band. The reason the number is lower than the archetype’s worst-case scenario is that a meaningful share of the city’s residential units are non-homestead, which provides structural insulation even inside a residential-heavy roll.

The driver of exposure is still the same dynamic the archetype names: a high homestead share combined with a commercial share that remains thin relative to the residential mass means the exemption lands on a large portion of the base at once. Of 71,475 residential housing units, 44.6% are owner-occupied, 12.3% are owned by out-of-state owners, and 43.1% are non-homestead but Florida-owned. That 43.1% Florida-owned non-homestead share is the structural buffer doing the work here. It is a local-ownership rental market, not an absentee-ownership story, and it is the reason Hollywood ranks 286 of 404 cities by exposure statewide, meaning most Florida cities are more exposed than Hollywood is.

Land-use composition

Share of taxable value by category, Hollywood, 2025 roll:

Residential dominates at 65.9% of just value across 52,861 parcels. Commercial is the second-largest category at 11.8% across 3,187 parcels, followed by Multifamily at 8.0% across 3,041 parcels. Industrial holds 4.3% across 743 parcels. Two figures in the table are worth noting: out-of-state owners account for 37.5% of commercial value and 40.5% of industrial value, meaning a substantial share of Hollywood’s most amendment-resilient categories is held by owners outside Florida. That is a transaction-velocity signal as much as an ownership observation.

What the exposure band means

Low exposure. The base is already substantially non-homestead. The amendment is a manageable headwind. Focus on protecting the diversified base that provides the insulation.

Looking ahead

Neither of the following changes the exposure figures above; both shape how Hollywood grows its base after the amendment takes effect.

First, beginning January 1, 2027, the annual assessment-increase cap on non-homestead property drops from 10% to 5%, covering commercial and industrial real property and small residential rentals of nine units or fewer. Because a capped property’s assessed value can rise only 5% per year, the primary mechanism for growing taxable value in these categories shifts to transactions: a sale or change of control resets the property to market value. Given that out-of-state owners hold 37.5% of commercial value and 40.5% of industrial value in Hollywood, transaction velocity in those categories matters more to base growth than it did under the old cap.

Second, new Florida residents who did not maintain a Florida permanent residence as of December 31, 2026 phase into the larger exemption over five years rather than receiving it immediately. This cannot be read from the assessment roll, so all exposure figures here assume full application of the exemption to every homestead. Near-term exposure could run slightly lower than modeled in places with many recent arrivals still inside their five-year window.

Where the opportunity is

These recommendations are based solely on the tax roll’s land-use composition. They do not account for whether local land development regulations and zoning permit the use, whether there is local obstruction, or the political dynamics that typically decide what actually gets approved. This is a starting point for a conversation, not a development plan.

• Hollywood’s commercial share sits at 11.8% of just value, which is above the threshold where the commercial-spine move becomes the single biggest lever, but the category is still thin relative to the residential mass. The single highest-leverage move remains converting a share of future growth from rooftops to taxable commercial square footage that carries no homestead exemption. A neighborhood-serving retail node, a small office or medical-office cluster, or a light-flex business park on an existing arterial would each add non-homestead value that the amendment does not touch. Concentrating that growth along one corridor rather than scattering it is the difference between building a real non-homestead spine and keeping the commercial share permanently thin.
• The 43.1% Florida-owned non-homestead residential share is already doing significant work as a buffer. Multifamily rental at 8.0% of just value across 3,041 parcels is a meaningful contributor. Apartments pay full freight under the amendment, and well-sited rental near jobs and transit adds non-homestead value and workforce housing simultaneously. Allowing additional multifamily rental in appropriate locations deepens the buffer that is already keeping Hollywood’s exposure low.
• Industrial at 4.3% of just value is a smaller but real non-homestead anchor. Protecting existing industrial parcels from conversion to residential use and prioritizing industrial and commercial parcels for future growth rather than additional subdivisions keeps the non-homestead base deepening rather than diluting. Any existing employment anchor, whether a hospital, distribution facility, or government office complex, is a non-homestead taxpayer already in place and worth protecting.

Watch-out: do not solve a revenue hole by approving more single-family subdivisions. Each one adds homestead value the amendment will exempt while adding service demand the millage must cover. That is the trap that created the exposure profile in the first place, and it is the one move that makes the structural problem worse even when Hollywood’s current numbers look manageable.

Source and scope

All figures are computed from the Florida Department of Revenue 2025 final assessment roll, the most recent certified roll in the state’s possession. The roll is used as a structural proxy for tax-base composition, not as a dollar forecast for any specific budget year. HJR 1 / CS-HJR 1F is on the November 2026 ballot; the 2026 roll is the assessment roll in place when voters decide. If the amendment passes, the first roll affected is the 2027 roll at the $150,000 step, followed by the 2028 roll at the full $250,000 phase-in. When the 2026 and later rolls are certified, the analysis re-runs on the new data.

Ownership shares are measured on a residential-unit basis: each homestead-eligible parcel counts as one unit and each multifamily parcel counts by its number of apartment units. Out-of-state ownership is a mailing-address proxy, meaning it undercounts true outside ownership (an out-of-state owner using an in-state LLC address counts as Florida) and does not prove where an owner actually lives or resides. This read is a land-use-composition starting point, not a full fiscal, economic, or legal analysis.

Place: hollywood