Florida Commercial Rent Sales Tax: Repeal, Returns, and Refunds

Florida no longer charges sales tax on commercial rent. The state repealed the tax under Section 212.031 of the Florida Statutes effective October 1, 2025, and the repeal wiped out both the state rate and the county discretionary surtaxes that used to ride on top of it.1Florida Department of Revenue. Sales Tax on Commercial Rentals Repealed Effective October 1, 2025 If you are signing a lease now or paying rent on an existing one, no sales tax applies to any rental period beginning on or after that date. The complications that remain are all backward-looking: what to do about rent for months before October 2025, how to file the last returns, and how to recover tax that should not have been collected.

What the Repeal Eliminated

Before October 1, 2025, Florida was one of the few states that taxed the privilege of renting commercial real property. The tax reached office space, retail storefronts, warehouses, storage units, and any other arrangement where a tenant paid for the right to occupy non-residential space. Counties could layer a discretionary surtax of 0.5% to 1.5% on top of the state rate, which had already stepped down to 2.0% in June 2024.2Florida Department of Revenue. State Sales Tax Rate Imposed on Rentals, Leases, or Licenses to Use Real Property Reduced to 2.0%

The repeal, enacted through Chapter 2025-208, Laws of Florida, took the state rate to zero and ended the county surtaxes on commercial rent at the same time.1Florida Department of Revenue. Sales Tax on Commercial Rentals Repealed Effective October 1, 2025 Residential rent was never within this tax, and the repeal does not change sales tax on other transactions. If your business also sells taxable goods or services, those obligations continue as before.

Which Date Actually Matters: Period, Not Payment

The repeal turns on the rental period the payment covers, not on the date the check clears. This is the point that most often causes mistakes on both sides of a lease.

A landlord receiving late rent for a pre-October period cannot treat the tax as gone just because the repeal has taken effect. The Department of Revenue still expects that tax to be reported and remitted when the payment comes in. On the tenant side, if you prepaid for post-September rent and your landlord added tax to the invoice, that tax should not have been charged.

Final Returns Landlords Still Have to File

The tax is gone, but the last returns are not optional. Even where no tax is due for a period, a landlord with an active sales tax account tied to commercial rent needs to file through the final pre-repeal period before the Department will update the account’s status. Returns are filed on Form DR-15, the Sales and Use Tax Return, through the Department’s electronic portal.3Florida Department of Revenue. Florida Sales and Use Tax Return Electronic File and Pay Step-by-Step Guide

What the final return covers depends on your filing frequency:

  • Monthly filers: separate returns for July, August, and September 2025.
  • Quarterly filers: one return for July through September 2025.
  • Semiannual filers: one return for July through December 2025, with the non-taxable October through December rent left off.
  • Annual filers: one return for January through December 2025, with the non-taxable October through December rent left off.

One timing quirk worth flagging: when a due date lands on a weekend or holiday, filing deadlines move forward to the next business day, but electronic payment deadlines move backward to the previous business day so the state receives funds on time.4Florida Department of Revenue. Calendar of Electronic Payment Deadlines For Calendar Year 2026 Treating them as the same date can trigger a penalty on an otherwise clean return.

Refunds for Tax That Should Not Have Been Collected

If a landlord charged sales tax on rent that turned out to be non-taxable, whether because the rental period was post-September 2025 or because an exemption applied, the money can be recovered. The sequence is fixed: the landlord refunds the tenant first, then applies to the Department of Revenue for reimbursement. A tenant cannot claim directly from the state.

The claim is submitted on Form DR-26S, the Application for Refund for Sales and Use Tax, online, by mail, or by fax. The application requires the tax identification number, the exact amount, the collection period from the original return, the reason for the request, and documentation showing the tenant was refunded.5Florida Dept. of Revenue. Tax Refunds Information

The deadline is three years from the date the tax was paid. For tax collected in the final months before the repeal, that pushes the outside date into 2028, but the risk is complacency: once the tax went away, it is easy to forget there was ever anything to recover. If you know you overcollected or were overcharged, file the paperwork now rather than later.5Florida Dept. of Revenue. Tax Refunds Information

Penalties, Interest, and the Audit Window

Repeal does not forgive earlier obligations. The Department can still assess unpaid tax, penalties, and interest on pre-repeal rent, and the numbers compound quickly.

A landlord who never registered to collect the tax at all faces the worst exposure, because each month of rent reads as a nondisclosure rather than a late filing.

The Department generally has three years from the date a return was due or filed, whichever is later, to assess additional tax. Audits for the last pre-repeal periods can therefore arrive as late as 2028. If no return was ever filed for a period, the three-year clock does not start, and the exposure stays open. Keep the lease agreements, exemption certificates, filed returns, and payment confirmations through at least that audit window. Those records are what you use to answer an assessment, and once the tax itself is history, they are the only thing standing between you and whatever the Department concludes on its own.