The tax escape map: Billionaires are bolting for Florida from the West Coast and taking billions in tax revenue with them

The billionaire exodus from the West Coast to Florida is underway as the ultra-wealthy seek refuge from wealth taxes in states like California and Washington.

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Google cofounders Larry Page (net worth $244 billion) and Sergey Brin (net worth $226 billion) rushed to leave California last year before the Jan. 1 deadline for the California billionaire tax. Both have purchased property in Florida. Meanwhile, former Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz, whose net worth is $3.4 billion, and Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, whose net worth is $198 billion, also both bought property in the Sunshine State last month.

The tech titans and Schultz join Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, PayPal and Palantir cofounder Peter Thiel, Citadel founder Ken Griffin, and Oracle cofounder Larry Ellison, who have all bought property or moved their companies’ operations to Florida in the past couple of years.

The rush to buy in Florida has been fueled partly by California’s proposed Billionaire Tax Act, which, if passed, would charge billionaires who resided in California after Jan. 1, 2026 with a one-time tax on 5% their total net worth.

The bill, which would reportedly affect about 200 people, aims to collect $100 billion in revenue that would go toward funding health care, education, and food assistance. To get on the ballot in November, the proposal needs to collect 875,000 signatures from California residents by June. Once on the ballot, a simple majority in the November elections would make the effort pass and amend the state’s constitution to put it into place.

But not everyone is on board. Many wealthy individuals in California have come out against the tax, including Brin, who donated $20 million to a political action committee running three counter “spoiler” measures which if approved by voters would potentially weaken or yield legal challenges to the billionaire tax if it passes as well. Thiel also donated $3 million to the California Business Roundtable, a group opposing the billionaire tax.

There are also doubts about whether the bill, even if it is passed, will reach its goal of collecting $100 billion. With Page and Brin leaving the state before Jan. 1, as well as Uber cofounder Travis Kalanick who left for Texas, the tax could be robbed of a fourth of its $100 billion goal, according to a calculation by Fortune. A back-of-the-envelope calculation using the 5% wealth tax metric puts the dollar figure of taxes owed by Page at $13 billion and Brin at about $12 billion. Meanwhile 5% of Kalanick and Thiel’s wealth adds another $1 billion or so that brings the total potentially lost revenue to about $26 billion.

Still, the potential California billionaire tax isn’t the only effort pushing billionaires to migrate South. Washington’s wealth tax may have also played a role. Both Bezos and Schultz left Seattle before Washington Gov. Bob Ferguson signed into law Tuesday a high-earners income tax that would charge 9.9% on earnings of more than $1 million. The tax aims to bring in $3 billion to $4 billion per year from wealthy individuals while eliminating some sales tax on items like diapers and expanding funding for child care and health care.

Griffin, the lone former Chicago resident, left Illinois, moving Citadel to Miami in June 2022 after nearly three decades. At the time, Griffin pointed to the city’s crime and politics as the reason. Since then, Griffin and Citadel have together invested billions in Florida real estate.

Some of the reasons for the billionaires’ departure is the attractiveness of Florida’s low taxes as well as its nice weather. The state has no income tax and no capital gains tax, and Miami in particular has branded itself as a business-friendly alternative to high-tax cities in California and elsewhere. The billionaires who have moved to Florida can also easily afford to buy in the state’s most exclusive areas and secure increasingly pricey waterfront properties.

Miami, especially, is one of the most expensive luxury markets in the U.S. In 2025, more ultraluxury homes sold in Miami, according to the New York Times. While the median home price in Miami fell about 7% to $610,000 in March, at the ultra-high end range, demand is growing. Five years ago no home in Miami sold for $50 million, but in 2025, sales in this range made up 7% of the market, the Times reported.

Mark Zuckerberg

The Meta cofounder and his wife, Dr. Priscilla Chan reportedly secured a $170 million waterfront mansion on the western side of Indian Creek Island, a manmade refuge for the ultra-rich located in the Biscayne Bay west of Miami Beach. Zuckerberg’s property is only a few houses down from Jeff Bezos’ in-construction compound and includes a gym, hair salon, and massage room, according to The Wall Street Journal. Indian Creek, also known as Billionaire Bunker, has a mere 41 residents and has 24/7 security which adds to its exclusivity. The property would add to Zuckerberg’s myriad properties across the U.S. including in Hawaii