What the Public Can See
A Florida closing produces a recorded deed, and the deed names the buyer. Documentary stamp tax is paid on the deed at 70 cents for every hundred dollars of price, so anyone who reads the stamps can compute the price to the dollar. Within weeks the Property Appraiser's website shows the new owner, the mailing address for the tax bill, the sale price and the building sketch. Permits for any later work list the owner again. A Florida company is no hiding place on its own, because the state's register shows the company's manager and addresses to anyone who searches it.
The MLS is a separate record. Agents see a closing there, but the public does not, and a sale run as a Private Exclusive never appears on it at all. The deed is recorded either way. For most of our clients the question is not whether a record exists but whose name is on it.
Illustration. A sample record with invented values, labeled against the fields of a Palm Beach County property page
Three Ways to Hold Title
Holding title in your own name is the simplest and the most visible. A revocable trust puts the trustee's name on the deed, keeps the homestead, and carries the estate-planning benefits the trust exists to provide. A company puts the company's name on the deed. Buyers who want the company itself to be quiet form it in Florida and have it owned by a second company. The parent is formed in Wyoming, New Mexico, Nevada or Delaware, where owners are not published. A registered agent's address goes on every filing. The Florida register then shows a company managed by a company, and nothing else.
Florida also has its own tool, the land trust. The trustee, often a law firm or a trust company, holds title and appears on the deed. The beneficiary does not appear anywhere public, and the beneficiary can be a person or a company. The diagram shows how the layers sit, and the matrix under it shows whose name each record carries under each structure. The right one depends on the lender, the estate plan and the tax position, which is why the attorney and the CPA choose it.
Source: a 2025 guide on layered ownership prepared by an executive-privacy firm, and the Florida Land Trust Act
- Y: your name
- T: the trustee, C: the company, P: the parent company and its agent
- M: the company's manager and registered agent
- A: agents only. N: not listed
Source: Palm Beach County public records, the Florida Division of Corporations, and the structures above
Source: Florida Statutes 196.031 and 196.041, and lender practice on entity borrowers
The Homestead Trade-Off
The Property Appraiser grants the homestead exemption to a person who owns the home and lives in it on January 1. A company cannot claim it. A revocable trust usually can, when it gives the beneficiary the right to live in the home for life. A land trust can only when that interest is written in, which is the attorney's drafting to get right. The exemption itself is worth a few hundred dollars a year on a large home. What matters is the cap that comes with it. A homesteaded home's assessed value can rise no more than 3 percent a year, whatever the market does. A company's home is assessed at market each year, with a weaker 10 percent cap that does not apply to the school levies.
The chart and the table show the gap on a $10M home in the Town of Palm Beach at the town's 2025 rate. The market is assumed to rise 8 percent a year. By year ten the homesteaded owner pays $199,242 and the company pays $321,011, a difference of $121,769 in that year and $576,481 over the decade. Florida also shields a homestead from most creditors, a protection that belongs to a person rather than a company. It is one more reason the attorney's view of the structure matters before closing. The mechanics of the exemption and the cap are in our county property tax guide, and the residency side is in our guide to Florida domicile.
- A company's assessed value reaches $21.6M in year ten
- A homesteaded assessed value reaches $13.4M
- The gap costs $121,769 of tax in year ten, $576,481 over the decade
Illustration at the Town of Palm Beach 2025 rate of 14.8690 mills, a 3 percent homestead cap, no change in rates
Illustration: 14.8690 mills, a 3 percent homestead cap, the $50,000 exemption, no change in rates. Actual bills depend on the parcel
What the Structure Does Not Hide
A court can order the owner of any structure revealed. A lender will usually want a personal name on a residential mortgage, or commercial terms for a company. Insurers, utilities and the tax collector all need an address, and if that address is the house, the privacy is gone. A federal rule took effect on March 1, 2026 that would have reported every all-cash purchase by a company or a trust to the Treasury. It would have carried the names of the people behind the buyer. A federal court struck it down on March 19, and reporting is suspended while that order stands. The rule can come back in another form, and the standard Florida contract already carries the clause that would collect the information. The structure is only as private as the routine around it.
The routine is mostly administrative, and the table reproduces the parts of the privacy guide that apply to a home. Buyers who want the most separation use a different registered agent and a different mailing address for each company, so that one vendor's records never link the two. The structure also costs money to keep. Florida charges $125 to form a company and $138.75 a year for its report. Wyoming charges $100 to form one and $60 a year. A registered agent runs $50 to $200 a year for each company, and a virtual address $40 to $100 a month. A two-company structure costs roughly $1,000 to $2,000 a year to maintain before the attorney's and the CPA's time, which is small against the tax gap above but real.
Source: a 2025 guide on layered ownership prepared by an executive-privacy firm
How We Handle It
The question comes up when the buyer raises it, when the attorney does, or when the homestead math makes it worth asking. Often that is after the home has been chosen. The structure can change along the way. A buyer who starts in their own name can still close in a trust, and one who planned a company can decide the homestead matters more. What we protect is the door. The standard Florida contract has a box that lets the buyer assign it. The rider we wrote this month in Palm Beach Gardens reserved the right to assign to an entity the buyer controls or to a spouse. With that door open the entity is formed between contract and closing, which is how it is done most of the time.
The timing is not tight. A Florida company is formed in a few days and a Wyoming or New Mexico parent in a few more. The tax numbers follow the same week, and a land trust takes the attorney a little longer. The bank account is the slow step, one to two weeks, because banks verify the people behind a new entity. An ordinary closing period holds all of it. The exception is a developer's contract that restricts assignment, and there the entity is formed before signing. From contract to closing the practice is about names. The client's name stays out of the showing requests, the inspection reports and the closing file when the client wants it that way. The closing agent, the title insurer and the property insurer are told which name goes on the deed, the policy and the tax bill, and which address. When the structure allows homestead, the filing deadline of March 1 goes on the calendar at closing. Sellers who want the same discretion sell as a Private Exclusive through our seller services. Buyers begin with our buyer services, and the new-construction side of the same contract is in our guide to buying new construction. For families holding a home across generations, the structure is set alongside the estate plan, as our article on generational estates describes.
Source: our practice. Formation times vary by state and by bank
Bottom Line
Title can be held in your own name, in a trust or in a company, and each one changes what the public record shows. A company hides the name on the deed and costs the homestead and its cap, which is worth $121,769 a year by year ten on a $10 million island home. A trust keeps the homestead and keeps the name off the deed. The structure is chosen with the attorney and the CPA, it can change along the way, and the contract keeps the door open until closing.
For a buyer who wants to hold title quietly: Keep the right to assign in the contract. Form the entity when the attorney says, before closing. Keep every address, policy and account in its name.
The ownership options and the privacy routine are drawn from a 2025 guide on layered property ownership prepared by an executive-privacy firm. They are read alongside Florida Statutes 196.031 and 196.041 on homestead eligibility, 193.155 on change of ownership, and the Florida Land Trust Act. The federal reporting point reflects FinCEN's residential real estate rule of March 1, 2026 and the federal court order of March 19, 2026 that vacated it. Formation and agent fees are the published state fees and vendor prices in August 2026.
The year-ten illustration applies the Town of Palm Beach 2025 combined rate of 14.8690 mills to a $10M purchase. It assumes market value rises 8 percent a year and the homesteaded assessed value rises 3 percent a year. The $50,000 exemption applies, with the second $25,000 excluded from the school levies, and rates do not change. A company's home is assessed at market because the 10 percent non-homestead cap does not bind at 8 percent growth. This article describes the practical considerations from a real estate agent's side of the table. It is not legal or tax advice, and the structure is chosen and drafted by the buyer's attorney and CPA.
Florida Statutes sections 196.031 and 196.041, homestead exemption and beneficial title.
Florida Statutes section 193.155, assessment of homestead property and change of ownership.
Florida Statutes section 689.071, the Florida Land Trust Act.
FinCEN, residential real estate reporting rule, 31 CFR 1031.320, and Flowers Title Companies v. Bessent (E.D. Tex., March 19, 2026).
Florida Division of Corporations and Wyoming Secretary of State, formation and annual report fees.
Palm Beach County Property Appraiser, 2025 final millage rates.
