Sarasota County was owed more than $8.3M in property taxes because of fraudulent homestead exemptions. In Florida and other states, property owners can claim a tax break for the home they live in full-time, referred to as a homestead exemption. They can’t claim it on more than one property- legally. The full-scale review of the exemption for Sarasota County homeowners is the first-ever audit done anywhere in Florida. It;s already added nearly $76 million in added taxable value that will be billed to property owners in November. In all, the audit found of 110,000 total homestead exemptions, there were 547 confirmed cases of fraud, some of those cases dating back nearly ten years.