Jacksonvilleculture & etiquette

Florida gives new residents 30 days to obtain a Florida driver licence, but only 10 days to title and register a vehicle once you establish residency, and you cannot register without Florida-issued insurance from a Florida-licensed agent. People sequence this backwards, buy a car in week one, and find the registration deadline has passed while they were still shopping for cover.

Holders of a valid licence from Canada, France, Germany, South Korea or Taiwan are exempt from the written and road tests and can exchange directly. Everyone else takes both. This is a much shorter list than most states publish and it is worth checking before you plan the week — it is the difference between one appointment and three.

Florida homeowners' premiums are among the highest in the country, and the hurricane deductible is a percentage of the dwelling limit — commonly 2%, 5% or 10% — rather than a flat sum. Flood is a separate policy again and is not included in any standard homeowners' policy. Get a quote on the specific address before you make an offer; two houses a mile apart can differ by thousands a year.

If you own and permanently occupy a Florida home as of 1 January, you can claim the homestead exemption and, far more valuably, the Save Our Homes cap that limits annual assessment increases to 3% or the CPI change, whichever is lower — 2.7% for 2026. The filing deadline with the Duval County Property Appraiser is 1 March. Miss it and you wait a full year, with the assessment uncapped in the meantime.

Four municipalities voted out of the 1968 consolidation — Atlantic Beach, Neptune Beach, Jacksonville Beach and Baldwin — and run their own councils, police departments and building codes while their residents still pay Jacksonville's county-level millage and vote for its mayor. Meanwhile a great many 'Jacksonville, FL' addresses sit in St. Johns, Clay or Nassau County entirely. Check which government you are actually moving into before you sign.

Florida levies no personal income tax and the prohibition sits in the state constitution rather than in ordinary legislation. Practically, that means one tax return a year instead of two, no state withholding form on your first day, and no city or county income tax anywhere in Florida. The money is raised through a 7.5% sales tax in Duval County and through property tax instead.