The Complete Guide to Down Payment Assistance in Broward County

Sep 16

5 min read

Most first-time buyers in Broward County overestimate how much cash they need to close on a home — and never find out about the $80,000 to $120,000 in down payment assistance sitting on the table because nobody explained how it actually works. This guide breaks down every program available to Broward County buyers right now, exactly who qualifies, and how to apply.

Broward County's Homebuyer Purchase Assistance (HPA) Program

The county's flagship program is Broward County's Homebuyer Purchase Assistance (HPA) program, and it's the one most buyers should look at first. It offers up to $80,000 countywide — and up to $120,000 specifically in Weston — structured as a 0% interest, deferred second mortgage. You make no payments on it at all; instead, it's forgiven in full after you've lived in the home for 15 years. Sell or refinance before that, and the remaining balance typically comes due, so it's worth thinking of this as a long-term homeownership commitment, not free money with no strings.

The HPA program does have real limits worth knowing before you fall in love with a house: the purchase price is currently capped around $636,806, and the home has to become your primary residence, not an investment property or second home. Both of those figures move over time as the county adjusts the program, so treat them as a starting point for your conversation with a program-approved lender, not the final word.

Do You Qualify? Income Limits and Eligibility Basics

Eligibility for the county's HPA program is generally capped at 80% of Area Median Income (AMI) for your household size — a figure the county recalculates periodically, so your actual dollar threshold depends on your family size and the current year's table, not a single fixed number. Most programs in this space also require you to be a first-time homebuyer, typically meaning you haven't owned a home in the past three years — even if you've owned before, a long enough gap can qualify you again.

Nearly every down payment assistance program also requires a HUD-approved homebuyer education course before closing — usually a few hours online or in person covering budgeting, the mortgage process, and homeownership responsibilities. Build this into your timeline early; it's a real requirement, not a formality you can skip, and some lenders won't submit your assistance application without a completion certificate in hand.

City Programs You Can Stack on Top of the County's HPA

Several Broward cities run their own down payment assistance on top of the county program, and in many cases you can stack them together for even more assistance. Fort Lauderdale and Hollywood both maintain their own homebuyer programs with eligibility rules that don't always mirror the county's — Hollywood's program, for example, has been structured with a higher income ceiling around 120% AMI in some years, opening it up to moderate-income buyers who might not qualify for the county's stricter 80% AMI limit. Coral Springs, Sunrise, and Coconut Creek have all had first-time buyer assistance programs run through their housing or community development offices as well.

The catch with stacking is that each program has its own application, its own income documentation, and its own timeline — and not every combination is actually allowed. A lender who regularly works with these programs (not every lender does) can tell you quickly which combinations are realistic for your situation before you spend time applying to programs that won't work together.

The Florida Hometown Heroes Program

Separate from the county and city programs, Florida's statewide Hometown Heroes Housing Program provides down payment and closing cost assistance to eligible full-time Florida workers, structured as a 0% non-amortizing second mortgage that comes due when you sell, refinance, or stop using the home as your primary residence. The program has broadened its eligible-occupation list significantly since it launched, so don't assume it's limited to first responders and teachers — check the current eligibility list rather than ruling yourself out based on an older version of the rules.

Hometown Heroes can potentially be combined with the county's HPA program, which is exactly the kind of stacking question worth running past a program-experienced lender before you assume either program on its own is your only option.

Can You Use Down Payment Assistance to Buy a Condo?

Generally yes, but with an extra layer of approval that single-family homes don't require. Most down payment assistance programs require the condo building itself to meet certain approval standards — commonly FHA condo approval or an equivalent lender requirement — on top of your own individual eligibility. Given everything happening with condo special assessments and milestone inspections across South Florida right now, this is doubly worth confirming early: a building with financial or structural red flags can lose its approved status, which would derail an assistance application already in progress.

How to Apply, Step by Step

Get pre-qualified with a lender who has direct experience with Broward's down payment assistance programs — not every lender processes these regularly, and the wrong lender can slow you down or miss stacking opportunities entirely.
Complete a HUD-approved homebuyer education course and keep your completion certificate; most programs require it before or during the application.
Confirm your household income against the current AMI limits for your specific household size and the program you're targeting.
Apply to the county HPA program (and any eligible city or state programs) through your lender, generally alongside your mortgage pre-approval, not after you've already found a house.
Find a home within the program's purchase price cap and move through underwriting with your lender coordinating the assistance funds alongside your primary mortgage.
Close — the assistance typically funds directly at closing as a second mortgage lien on the property, on top of your primary loan.

A Word on Program Funding and Why Timing Matters

These programs are funded in allocated pools, not an open-ended entitlement — when a given year's or cycle's funds run out, the program can pause new applications until the next funding cycle opens. Income limits, purchase price caps, and even which cities have active programs in a given year can all shift. Every dollar figure in this guide reflects the programs as documented at the time of writing; confirm current numbers directly with the county, the specific city program, or with me before you build a purchase timeline around any of them.

Get Help Navigating Down Payment Assistance in Broward County

Down payment assistance can be the difference between renting another year and closing on your first home, but the programs are genuinely easy to apply for wrong or miss entirely without local guidance. If you're a first-time buyer in Broward County, contact me and I'll help you figure out exactly which programs you qualify for and connect you with a lender who knows how to stack them correctly.