Florida Tax Certificate API — Model Context Protocol

Florida Tax Certificate API ships a Model Context Protocol (MCP) server so AI coding agents and copilots can search Florida tax-certificate records directly, without you scraping 67 county certificate-sale portals or writing custom integrations.

Florida Tax Certificate API is an independent data platform and is not affiliated with the Florida Department of Revenue, any county tax collector or clerk of court, LienHub, RealAuction / RealTaxLien, or TaxCertSale.

What is MCP

MCP is an open transport for connecting LLM agents to live tools and data sources. Once installed, your agent gains 8 new tools that hit Florida Tax Certificate API on your behalf — same data as /api/v1, same auth key, but invoked by the model.

Connection

Setting	Value
Endpoint	https://fltaxcerts.com/api/mcp
Transport	HTTP streaming (MCP 2025-06-18+)
Auth header	Authorization: Bearer fltc_live_...
Plan needed	Any plan with mcp in surfaces (all tiers)

Every paid plan from Developer ($19/mo) up includes MCP access. As of REQ-006 (2026-06-28), MCP calls draw from the same monthly credit bucket as REST — there is no separate "MCP calls" budget. One MCP tool call costs 1 credit; one REST request costs 1 credit; both decrement the same balance.

If you only need MCP and don't care about REST, the standalone $5 MCP Starter add-on gives you 1,000 MCP credits / month with no REST surface. REST requests on a Starter key return 403 rest_disabled.

Install

Claude Desktop

Add to ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json (macOS) or %APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json (Windows):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "florida-tax-cert-api": {
      "transport": "http",
      "url": "https://fltaxcerts.com/api/mcp",
      "headers": {
        "Authorization": "Bearer fltc_live_xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx"
      }
    }
  }
}

Restart Claude Desktop. The tools appear under the slider icon in the prompt bar.

Claude Code

claude mcp add florida-tax-cert-api \
  --transport http \
  --url https://fltaxcerts.com/api/mcp \
  --header "Authorization: Bearer fltc_live_xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx"

Run claude mcp list to confirm. New tools are namespaced mcp__florida-tax-cert-api__<tool>.

Cursor

Add to ~/.cursor/mcp.json:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "florida-tax-cert-api": {
      "url": "https://fltaxcerts.com/api/mcp",
      "headers": {
        "Authorization": "Bearer fltc_live_xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx"
      }
    }
  }
}

Tools

Tool	What it does	Example prompt
search-certificates	Search tax certificates by county, status, tax year, holder, vendor, face range.	"Find sold Polk County tax certificates from tax year 2023 with face over $2k."
get-certificate	Full certificate detail by id — bid rate, holder, redemption, tax-deed state.	"Pull the full record for certificate cert_7a3f29b1."
certificates-by-parcel	Every certificate tied to one county parcel id.	"Show all tax certificates on parcel 262813-000000-012345 in Polk."
certificate-counts	Aggregate certificate counts by status, scopable to county + tax year.	"How many certificates were redeemed vs. struck to the county in Polk for 2023?"
search-holders	Search the certificate holder / fund directory and portfolio metadata. Limited preview: 3 records.	"Look up the certificate holder named Magnolia Tax Fund."
search-lands-available	Certificates struck to the county after an unsold tax-deed sale. Limited preview: 2 records.	"Are there any lands-available parcels listed in Polk right now?"
search-certificate-sales	Annual county certificate-sale (auction) summaries: date, vendor, volume, bid rate.	"When is Orange County's next certificate sale and who runs it?"
list-counties	Discover valid county slugs and per-county certificate-sale vendor + URL.	"Which Florida counties sell certificates through LienHub?"

Each tool returns the same JSON shape as the corresponding REST endpoint at /api/v1/*, so agent-built workflows can graduate to direct REST integration without changing data contracts.

Dataset depth varies by tool. The certificate tools run against the full dataset: 1,267,795 certificates across 52 counties, plus 112 annual certificate-sale summaries and a 67-county sale directory. search_holders and search_lands_available are live and stable but their datasets hold zero records — every call returns an empty result set whose text is prefixed [DATASET NOT YET INGESTED] and whose meta.coverage.status is not_yet_ingested. That is not a negative search result; do not report it as "Florida has no such records". Build agent workflows on the certificate tools first.

Account & Credits

MCP calls draw from the same monthly credit bucket as REST API calls — one unified balance per customer. Every tool invocation costs 1 credit, just like a GET /api/v1/... request. Check your remaining budget any time:

GET /api/v1/account/usage

Top up or change plans at /account/billing. The standalone MCP Starter plan ($5/mo, 1,000 credits) is MCP-only and does not include REST access — every other plan (Developer and above) includes both MCP and REST under the same bucket.

Worked Examples

Try these in a chat after install:

1. Lien prospecting. "Find Polk County tax certificates for tax year 2023 with a face amount over $2,000 that are still unredeemed, then group them by city."
2. Certificate lookup. "Look up certificate cert_7a3f29b1 and tell me the parcel, holder, bid rate, and whether it has been redeemed."
3. Auction planning. "Summarize Orange County's last certificate sale — how many certificates sold, total face value, and the average winning bid rate."
4. Parcel history. "Show every tax certificate ever issued against parcel 262813-000000-012345 in Polk, oldest first, and tell me which are still unredeemed."
5. Coverage check. "Which Florida counties have certificate-level data available, and which ones only have the sale directory so far?"

Holder research and lands-available deal sourcing are the natural next prompts, but search_holders and search_lands_available sit on datasets that hold zero records today, so save those workflows until coverage grows.

Errors

• 403 rest_disabled — your plan is MCP-only (likely MCP Starter); hit /api/mcp instead of /api/v1, or upgrade.
• 403 mcp_disabled — your plan has no MCP access; upgrade to any tier ≥ Free.
• 429 rate_limited — monthly credit bucket exhausted (unified across MCP + REST), or per-minute burst cap hit; top up or wait until reset.

See Errors for the full error envelope.