Miami-Dade splits along product type, and the gap shows up in inventory before it shows up in price. MIAMI REALTORS reported on 16 September 2026, covering August, that single-family housing carried 4.9 months of supply and a median 40 days from listing to contract, against 51 a year earlier. Condominiums carried 12.1 months and 66 days. Single-family median price was $680,000, up 3.82% year over year; condominium median price was $408,000, down 0.49%. All-cash purchases were 37.8% of closed sales and 50.5% of existing condominium sales, against a national figure of roughly 27% that MIAMI REALTORS attributes to the National Association of Realtors.
That divergence matters more to a foreign buyer than to a local one, because the condominium is the product a foreign buyer is most often shown: the segment with softer pricing and nearly three times the inventory is where cross-border capital tends to enter. Foreign buying contracted over the same period. The National Association of Realtors reported on 29 July 2026, covering April 2025 to March 2026, $45.3 billion of foreign buyer purchases across 67,100 existing homes, down 19.1% in dollar volume, with Florida the leading state at 20%.
FIRPTA withholds 15% of the gross sale price from a foreign seller at closing, and that withholding is not the tax. The Foreign Investment in Real Property Tax Act operates through section 1445 of the Internal Revenue Code, which requires the buyer to deduct and withhold 15% of the amount realized. The amount realized is the sale price, not the gain. The January 2026 revision of the Form 8288 instructions confirms that neither the rate nor the thresholds changed for 2026.
The distinction is where cross-border sellers lose money. The federal tax is computed on the gain at long-term capital gains rates, which for 2026 run 0% up to $49,450 of taxable income, 15% to $545,500 and 20% above that for an unmarried filer under Revenue Procedure 2025-32. The 3.8% net investment income tax does not apply, because section 1411(e)(1) excludes non-resident aliens, and Florida levies no state income tax. On an asset that has appreciated modestly, 15% of the gross price can exceed the entire tax owed, and the excess returns only on filing a Form 1040-NR.
"Withholding is not taxation, and the difference is working capital," said Adam Redolfi, Founding Partner of Alure Capital. "Fifteen percent of a gross price leaves the closing table on the day of sale. The refund arrives after a return is filed for that tax year. Sellers who have not planned for that gap finance it at whatever it costs them."
Two reductions exist and both turn on the buyer rather than the seller. The rate falls to 10% where the amount realized exceeds $300,000 but does not exceed $1,000,000 and the buyer acquires the property for use as a residence, and withholding is eliminated below $300,000 under the same condition, which the IRS defines as definite plans by the buyer or a family member to reside at the property for at least 50% of the days it is used by any person in each of the first two twelve-month periods after the transfer. A foreign seller whose buyer is an investor or an entity qualifies for neither, and cannot control which buyer appears.
Form 8288-B reduces withholding to the tax actually expected, and the IRS states it will normally act on an application by the ninetieth day after a complete application is received. That is longer than most Miami closings, which makes the certificate an operational decision taken at listing rather than a tax decision taken at closing. A seller without a US taxpayer identification number will also not receive a stamped Form 8288-A, which is the document the credit depends on.
A non-resident alien who rents a US property is taxed by default under section 871(a) at 30% of gross rent, with no deduction for interest, property taxes, insurance, depreciation or management, and a tenant or property manager paying that rent must withhold at the same rate unless the owner furnishes Form W-8ECI.
The election under section 871(d) treats the income as effectively connected with a US trade or business, moving it to a net basis at graduated rates after deductions; the France-United States income tax convention provides a parallel route at Article 6. It is made by a signed statement attached to Form 1040-NR under Treasury Regulation 1.871-10(d)(1), and once revoked cannot be remade before the fifth taxable year following revocation. On a leveraged, depreciating rental asset it is frequently the difference between a taxable position and a sheltered one, and it is the most commonly omitted item in cross-border ownership files.
A non-resident who is not a US citizen receives a credit of $13,000 under section 2102(b)(1), equivalent to an exemption of $60,000 against US-situs assets. That threshold is not indexed for inflation, the top federal estate tax rate is 40%, and Florida real property is a US-situs asset. Holding it through a single-member LLC does not change that, and holding it through a US corporation converts the real property into US-situs stock rather than removing it.
Treaty relief is where the number moves. The 1978 France-United States estate and gift tax convention, as amended by the protocol of 8 December 2004, replaces the flat credit with a pro-rated one. Article 12(3) takes the unified credit available to a US citizen and multiplies it by the ratio of the US-situs gross estate to the worldwide gross estate, with the domestic $13,000 as a floor. Public Law 119-21, signed on 4 July 2025, raised the basic exclusion amount for a US domiciliary to $15,000,000 for 2026, a credit of $5,945,800, so the pro-rated credit available to a French domiciliary rose with it.
The fraction decides the outcome. The treaty shelters most where the American asset is a large share of a modest worldwide estate, and least where a mid-sized Miami apartment sits inside a substantial European one. This is not a $15,000,000 exemption for foreign buyers generally, and comparable treaties with other jurisdictions run on different terms.
The United States is only half the calculation, and the home-country treaty rarely does what buyers assume. The France-United States income tax convention of 31 August 1994 illustrates the trap, because it applies two different relief methods inside a single article. For rental income, Article 6 makes the rent taxable in the United States and Article 24(1)(a)(i) grants a French resident a credit equal to the French tax on that income. The official guidance to French return Form 2047 states that French tax generally means income tax increased by social levies, which run at 17.2%. The credit absorbs both, and the rent is sheltered.
For capital gains, Article 24(1)(a)(iii) expressly covers Article 13(1) and grants a credit equal only to the tax actually paid in the United States, capped at the French tax. Where the American tax is lower, the difference remains payable in France at 19% income tax plus 17.2% social levies, with a surtax of 2% to 6% above a €50,000 taxable gain. French holding-period relief eventually eliminates that base, after twenty-two years for income tax and thirty for social levies. A short, heavily depreciated hold is where the gap is widest.
The point generalises beyond France. A foreign buyer should establish, before acquisition, which relief method the home-country treaty applies to a gain, because it is frequently not the one it applies to rent. Wealth taxation behaves the same way: France taxes residents on worldwide real estate above €1,300,000 of net taxable value at 0.50% to 1.50%, and Article 24(1)(c) credits only wealth tax paid in the United States, capped at the French tax. There is no federal wealth tax, so that credit is nil.
A single-member US LLC is disregarded for federal income tax under Treasury Regulation 301.7701-3(b)(1), so its owner is treated as holding the property directly and it changes nothing about income tax or estate tax exposure. It provides liability separation under state law and creates a federal filing obligation: a foreign-owned disregarded entity must file Form 5472 with a pro forma Form 1120 annually. The penalty is $25,000, with a further $25,000 for each thirty-day period the failure continues after the ninety-day notice period.
A US corporation applies the 21% corporate rate under section 11(b), forfeits the individual long-term capital gains rates on exit and adds a second layer on distribution; a foreign corporation carries a 30% branch profits tax under section 884(a), treaty-reducible for a qualified resident. Each trades a known annual cost for an estate-tax outcome that only pays off at certain estate sizes.
Foreign civil-law vehicles require particular care. A French SCI is not on the per se corporation list at Treasury Regulation 301.7701-2(b)(8)(i), which names only the société anonyme for France. It is an eligible entity whose default US classification depends on whether its members have limited liability under the governing law and its own documents, so it can be classified as a partnership, as an association taxable as a corporation, or as a disregarded entity, with materially different consequences on exit. That is determined on the documents, through integrated legal expertise, and never by a general rule.
Property tax is assessed differently for a non-resident. Miami-Dade adopted 2025 total millage, across all taxing authorities, of 19.9878 per thousand in the City of Miami and 18.7601 in Miami Beach. A non-resident cannot claim the homestead exemption, so the assessment stays at just value and the applicable limit is the 10% non-homestead cap under Florida Statutes 193.1554, which does not cover school district levies, roughly a third of the bill. Insurance has moved the other way: the Florida Office of Insurance Regulation reported on 1 July 2026 a Miami-Dade average premium including wind of $5,975, with the downward rate trend that began in 2024 continuing into 2026.
Condominium carrying costs are the item with no reliable public statistic and the largest hidden liability. No government series tracks association fees; the available figures come from listing portals and brokerages. What is established is statutory. Florida Statutes 718.112(2)(g) requires a structural integrity reserve study for every building of three habitable storeys or more, with a 31 December 2025 deadline that has passed and an outer limit of 31 December 2026, and House Bill 913, effective 1 July 2025, allows a board with majority approval to pause reserve contributions for up to two consecutive budget years, for a budget adopted on or before 31 December 2028, but only where a milestone inspection was completed in the previous two calendar years and only to fund the repairs that inspection recommends. A moderate monthly fee in a 2026 listing is therefore not evidence that a building is funded, and Alure Capital's own reading, rather than a published finding, is that this regime explains part of the August divergence.
Financing is constrained for the same reason. Only 21 of 2,397 condominium buildings across the three South Florida counties are approved by the Federal Housing Administration, or 0.9%, per MIAMI REALTORS on 16 September 2026. The Freddie Mac Primary Mortgage Market Survey, a weekly survey average rather than a daily quote, put the 30-year fixed rate at 6.95% for the week ending 17 September 2026 against 6.26% a year earlier, but it measures conforming loans to borrowers with 20% down and US credit histories, which is not the foreign national profile. Foreign national programmes are portfolio products held outside the agencies, and Florida brokers advertise 25% to 40% down, a range that is market practice rather than a published statistic.
"The buyers who do well here decide the exit before they decide the address," said Adam Redolfi, who was born in Nice and has advised on the Miami-Paris axis for more than fifteen years. "Structure, holding period, and the treaty article that applies to the gain. Everything else in the file is negotiable."
Alure Capital's published analysis is collected in the Intelligence section.
For commercial and trophy mandates in Miami and New York, and hotel acquisition mandates in Europe: contact@alurecapital.com
FIRPTA is the Foreign Investment in Real Property Tax Act, which operates through section 1445 of the Internal Revenue Code and requires a buyer to withhold 15% of the gross amount realized when a foreign person sells US real property. The rate falls to 10% where the amount realized is between $300,000 and $1,000,000 and the buyer will use the property as a residence, and withholding is eliminated at $300,000 or less on the same condition. The January 2026 Form 8288 instructions confirm these figures for 2026.
No. FIRPTA withholding is a prepayment against the seller's liability. The tax is computed on the gain at long-term capital gains rates of 0%, 15% or 20% under Revenue Procedure 2025-32, without the 3.8% net investment income tax, which section 1411(e)(1) does not apply to non-resident aliens. Any excess is recovered by filing Form 1040-NR, or reduced in advance through a Form 8288-B withholding certificate, on which the IRS states it will normally act by the ninetieth day after a complete application is received.
A non-resident who is not a US citizen receives a credit of $13,000 under section 2102(b)(1), equivalent to a $60,000 exemption, against a top rate of 40%. An estate tax treaty can replace that with a pro-rated share of the full US credit: under Article 12(3) of the France-United States estate and gift tax convention as amended in 2004, a French domiciliary receives the US citizen credit multiplied by the ratio of US-situs to worldwide gross estate. Public Law 119-21 raised the 2026 basic exclusion amount to $15,000,000, a credit of $5,945,800 before proration.
Adam Redolfi, Founding Partner of Alure Capital, was born in Nice, is a native French and English speaker, and has executed more than $1.25 billion in transactions over more than fifteen years across residential, commercial, new development and equity raised. Alure Capital is a multi family office for real estate with offices in Miami, New York and Paris, advising UHNWI families on cross-border acquisitions between France and the United States.
Alure Capital is a multi family office for real estate serving UHNWI, family offices and institutional investors. Brokerage, private equity, hotel acquisition, real estate development, commercial real estate and integrated legal expertise within a single structure. Three offices, in Miami, New York and Paris, and international advisory capability across 40 destinations. The firm is led by Adam Redolfi, Founding Partner, born in Nice, who has executed more than $1.25 billion in transactions over more than fifteen years of practice. Supported by a multilingual team of finance-trained professionals operating across seven languages. Strictly off-market mandates. NDA-protected processes. Single-principal advisory. Alure Capital does not retail. It does not advertise. It does not serve volume. Every mandate is executed under NDA. Contact: contact@alurecapital.com
MIAMI REALTORS monthly statistical release, 16 September 2026, and international report, 27 January 2026. National Association of Realtors, International Transactions in U.S. Residential Real Estate, 29 July 2026. Internal Revenue Service: FIRPTA withholding, Exceptions from FIRPTA withholding, Withholding certificates, and Estate tax for nonresidents not citizens of the United States; Instructions for Form 8288 (revision January 2026), Form 5472 and Form 706-NA. Internal Revenue Code sections 11, 871, 884, 1411, 1445 and 2102; Treasury Regulations 301.7701-2, 301.7701-3 and 1.871-10; Revenue Procedure 2025-32 and Public Law 119-21. France-United States conventions of 31 August 1994 (Articles 6, 13, 23 and 24) and 24 November 1978 as amended in 2004 (Article 12). French Directorate General of Public Finances, Form 2047 guidance and Form 2042-IFI. Florida Statutes 193.1554 and 718.112(2)(g), and House Bill 913. Miami-Dade Property Appraiser, Florida Office of Insurance Regulation and Freddie Mac. Figures as of 20 September 2026.
