Through five months of 2026 fiscal year, revenue total not quite 50% of FY 2025 figure
February has proven to be the best month so far this fiscal year for the Sarasota County Tourist Development Tax — or, “bed tax” — revenue, as shown in the latest reports release by Sarasota County Tax Collector Mike Moran and his staff.
The total turned over to the Tax Collector’s Office for February was $6,633,140.70, the reports note. That is higher by $779,547.94 — approximately 13.3% — than the amount the office received for February 2025, the document makes clear. The latter figure was $5,853,592.76.
In fact, that month-over-month jump is the second highest since the fiscal year began on Oct. 1, 2025. The only month with greater growth has been October itself. The jump in revenue was $970,949.88, the reports say. In October 2024, the funds added up to $1,724,067.28; in October 2025, the total was $2,695,017.16, which marks an increase of approximately 56%.
The Tourist Development Tax is collected on rentals of accommodations countywide for six months or less time. A county ordinance governs how the money is used. Among the designated expenditures are those for beach maintenance and renourishment, as well as the marketing of the county to visitors.
With revenue from five months of the current fiscal year, the Tourist Development Tax total is $21,824,862.72, the new reports further note. That is not quite half of the funds turned over to the Tax Collector’s Office in the 2025 fiscal year: $47,423,762.10.
During the first half of the 2025 fiscal year, representatives of both Visit Sarasota County, the organization that handles tourism marketing for the county, and the Tax Collector’s Office pointed out that many rental units suffered significant damage during the 2024 hurricane season. Even as late as May 2025, some owners of Siesta Key properties still were awaiting permits to repair properties, Lourdes Ramirez, president of the nonprofit organization Protect Siesta Key, told the County Commission.
For the first five months of the 2025 fiscal year, the total in the initial Tax Collector Office reports for February 2025 was $18,544,619.97. Thus, the sum for October 2025 through February of this year is nearly 17.7% higher than the tally for the same period of the 2025 fiscal year.
March and April typically are the best months for the collections, as shown in the reports over past years. In March 2025, for example, the revenue added up to more than $7.5 million. In April 2025, it exceeded $5 million.
Another detail of the latest reports is the fact that the revenue Airbnb has remitted to the Tax Collector’s Office from its hosts through February of this fiscal year added up to $3,935,372.37. That is up approximately 44.6%, compared to the figure of $2,721,316.59 through February 2025.
Altogether, so far this fiscal year, the rentals of accommodations through online platforms — including TripAdvisor and HomeAway and all of their subsidiaries — has represented 24.77% of the total. Through the same five-month period of the 2025 fiscal year, that figure was 21.14%.
In regard to the collections by location, Siesta Key and the City of Sarasota vie for the honor each year of being declared the collector of the largest portion of the revenue. The city prevailed in the 2025 fiscal year, though Siesta “won” the title in the 2024 fiscal year.
Through February, the city was slightly ahead, with 22.71% of the revenue. Siesta accommodations accounted for 22.23%.
Largely because of the hurricane damage, the city had a lead of 26.46% to Siesta’s 17.33% through February 2025.
One other figure of note in the latest reports is the hike in the collections for January. The initial data showed that the January total was up $199,193.28, compared to the January 2025 tally.
However, the new reports put the month-over-month increase at $385,231.04, which is close to 7% higher than the previous number.
Representatives of the Tax Collector’s Office have explained that audits and other enforcement action — and staff’s efforts to find hosts who have not been paying the tax — can lead to modifications in the figures from month to month.
Along with the regular reports from the Tax Collector’s Office, Visit Sarasota County releases monthly data from a Tallahassee firm, Downs & St. Germain Research, about tourism in the county.
The following are details from the firm’s report for February:
- The number of visitors was 101,400 this February, down a little more than 4%, compared to the 105,800 total in February 2025.
- Visitors’ direct expenditures added up to $174,735,600 this February, which marked a decline of approximately 3.2%, compared to the tally of $180,328,600 in February 2025.
- Lodging occupancy was 80.5% in February of this year, while it was 84.1% in February 2025.
- The average room rate for lodging this February was $361.06, which was up nearly 7.6%, compared to the figure of $335.68 in February 2025.
- This February, the number of room nights sold was 317,900. In February 2025, the count was 330,700, which was about 4% higher.