Florida couple’s first home purchase conceals costly hidden obligations

CITRUS COUNTY, Fla. — Newlyweds Sarah Proctor and William Cronshaw felt lucky to find their first double-wide manufactured home near a lake in Citrus County for under $100,000. But the joy of owning their place did not last long.

The young couple bought the house in 2022 without realizing it had expensive strings attached.

Months after closing, their mortgage payment shot up by $200 monthly. They were stuck paying for a controversial clean energy program loan made by the previous owner, a loan paid back through property taxes.

PACE stands for property-assessed clean energy. It’s a home improvement financing program.

It requires no money down and is paid off through a property tax assessment, which can increase property taxes by thousands of dollars a year. Sarah Proctor did not find out until after buying the home that the prior owner took out a $9,300 PACE loan for an A/C upgrade.

Several Tampa Bay area counties, including Pinellas, Hillsborough, and Polk, have restricted or stopped the PACE program in recent years after unsuspecting homeowners found themselves buried in unaffordable tax bills.

Usually, at closing, the title company clears all outstanding loans or liens attached to a property before it sells.

But the PACE loans travel with the property. Proctor said they didn’t see the PACE assessment in the breakdown of their payment. Her title company said that is because the taxes for 2023 have not been published yet.

However, their title insurance policy noted the PACE financing agreement under “exceptions from coverage” and stated it would be collected with the taxes.

Proctor told ABC Action News. “This has been a strain on us, was definitely not something we expected.”

Before buying a home, check the county clerk of court website to see if the seller has a Florida PACE Funding Agency loan. PACE assessments can take as long as 30 years to pay off and can be as much as 20 percent of the home’s value. Interest rates are typically between 6 and 8-and-a-half percent.