Gulfport and Biloxi apartment operating costs are driven above all by three lines: property tax on rental property assessed at 15% of true value, wind and flood insurance priced for one of the most hurricane-exposed coastlines in the country, and water and sewer charges, with Biloxi weighing steep rate increases and Gulfport funding major system upgrades. Each of those lines has shifted recently, and owners on the Mississippi Gulf Coast who budget from last year’s numbers are likely to come up short.
Gulfport and Biloxi are separate, independent cities in Harrison County, and each serves as one of the county’s two seats. According to 2020 Census counts for Harrison County cities, Gulfport had 72,926 residents, Biloxi 49,449, and the county 208,621. Because the two cities share a coastline, an insurance market and a county assessor but set their own millage and utility rates, a building’s operating budget depends a great deal on which side of the city line it sits. This guide walks through the main cost lines in the order most owners feel them.
How Mississippi taxes rental apartments
Mississippi assesses property at a fraction of its “true value,” and the fraction depends on the class. Mississippi State University Extension’s guide to Mississippi property taxes describes the classes:
- Class I: owner-occupied single-family homes, assessed at 10% of true value.
- Class II: other real property, including rental residential property such as apartments, assessed at 15%.
- Class III: business personal property, such as furniture, appliances and equipment, also assessed at 15%.
Apartment buildings therefore carry a 50% higher assessment ratio than owner-occupied homes before any millage is applied. Homestead exemptions apply only to Class I property, so they do not reduce the bill on a rental building.
Two other features of the Mississippi system shape the budget. Millage rates are set each September for the fiscal year that begins October 1, so owners learn the coming year’s rate only weeks before it takes effect. And growth in local tax receipts is generally capped at 10% over the highest of the three prior years, with exclusions such as debt service and new construction, which limits how quickly a city or county can grow its levy but does not cap any one property’s bill.
Business personal property is a separate bill
Because furnishings, laundry equipment, appliances and maintenance equipment fall into Class III, apartment owners should expect a personal property assessment alongside the real estate bill. Buildings that provide furnished units, including those serving temporary workers or insurance-displaced households after storms, carry more of this property than unfurnished buildings.
Millage in Gulfport and Biloxi for 2026
Millage is where the two cities diverge. The rate on a given building combines city, school district and county levies.
Biloxi’s first increase in 25 years
On September 1, 2026, the Biloxi City Council voted 4–2 to raise the city’s millage by one mill, from 30.10 to 31.10 mills, for the fiscal year that began October 1, 2026. WLOX reported it as Biloxi’s first millage increase in 25 years.
Gulfport and Harrison County
Gulfport’s proposed fiscal 2026 budget did not raise the city’s millage rate, and it included $26 million for water and sewer improvements across the city. Harrison County’s notice for fiscal 2026 proposed countywide millage of 31.37 mills, down from 32.84, and the county adopted a budget of about $324 million with no countywide increase.
Combined rates and what they mean for a bill
In its September 2026 coverage, WLOX reported combined city, school and county millage of 111.77 mills in Biloxi and 131.96 mills in Gulfport. Those totals come from a single news report and may not reflect Biloxi’s new one-mill increase, so owners should confirm the exact rate for their parcel with the Harrison County tax collector.
The figures still show how the calculation works. Take a building with a true value of $3,000,000:
- Assessed value: 15% of $3,000,000 is $450,000.
- At 111.77 mills (Biloxi, as reported): $450,000 × 0.11177 is about $50,300 a year.
- At 131.96 mills (Gulfport, as reported): $450,000 × 0.13196 is about $59,380 a year.
- Biloxi’s one-mill increase: adds about $450 a year to that same building.
On a per-unit basis, the difference is easier to see. If that $3,000,000 building has 24 units, the reported Gulfport rate works out to roughly $2,470 per unit per year, or about $206 a month, while the reported Biloxi rate works out to about $2,100 per unit per year, or about $175 a month. A difference of roughly $30 per unit per month is small compared with rent, but across a building and over a holding period it adds up, and it is one reason two otherwise similar properties a few miles apart can trade at different prices.
The same building as an owner-occupied Class I home would be assessed at $300,000, a third less, which is one reason the per-unit tax on Coast apartments often surprises buyers coming from homeownership.
Wind insurance and the Mississippi wind pool
For most Gulf Coast apartment owners, insurance is the most volatile line in the budget, and wind coverage is the heart of it. Harrison County lies within the coastal territory served by the Mississippi Windstorm Underwriting Association (MWUA), the state’s wind pool, which the Mississippi Insurance Department describes as covering the six coastal counties. MWUA policies cover wind and hail only; flood requires a separate policy.
The wind pool is the insurer of last resort for properties that cannot find wind coverage in the voluntary market, and its pricing reflects the region’s loss history. The Mississippi Insurance Department’s ten-year retrospective on insurance on the Coast after Katrina recounts that proposed commercial wind rate increases of more than 200% after the storm were cut to 142% in 2007, and that rates then fell an average of 11% in 2008.
Why the loss history still matters
Hurricane Katrina made landfall on August 29, 2005, and the National Weather Service records Katrina’s 28-foot storm surge: surge of 25 to 28 feet above normal tide along parts of the Mississippi coast, approaching 28 feet in Bay St. Louis and Pass Christian. As of August 1, 2006, Hancock, Harrison and Jackson counties had generated 236,372 insurance claims and about $7.62 billion in payments for Katrina and Rita combined.
Insurers price Coast property against that experience. For an apartment owner, the practical consequences are higher deductibles, often expressed as a percentage of insured value for named storms, and premiums that can move sharply at renewal after an active season anywhere in the Gulf.
Reading a wind policy before renewal
Because wind is the largest insurance exposure on the Coast, it pays to understand the main parts of a policy rather than just the premium. Owners should know:
- The named-storm deductible. How it is calculated, whether as a percentage of insured value or a flat amount, and whether it applies per building or per occurrence.
- The insured value. Whether it reflects current replacement cost; an outdated value can leave a building underinsured when construction costs have risen.
- Ordinance or law coverage. When a damaged building is repaired, the work generally has to meet the codes in force at that time. With Biloxi now on portions of the 2024 International Building Code, coverage for the added cost of code-compliant repairs is worth reviewing.
- Loss of rents. Whether the policy replaces rental income while units are uninhabitable after a storm, and for how long.
Mitigation grants do not cover apartments
Mississippi has expanded its Strengthen Mississippi Homes program, which offers grants of up to $10,000 for FORTIFIED roofs. According to the Insurance Department’s June 2026 announcement of Strengthen Mississippi Homes grants, the grants cover primary, single-family, owner-occupied homes only, so apartment buildings and other rentals do not qualify. Starting July 1, 2026, the grants are directed to MWUA policyholders who have been insured for three consecutive years under SB 2409, with a statewide rollout expected in early 2027. Apartment owners who want stronger roofs and the insurance credits that may come with them will need to fund the work themselves.
Flood insurance after Risk Rating 2.0
Flood coverage is the second insurance line, and it changed substantially when FEMA moved the National Flood Insurance Program to its Risk Rating 2.0 pricing method. Mississippi’s two U.S. senators, citing FEMA data in June 2025, said that 84% of Mississippi NFIP policyholders had seen premiums rise and that about 2,200 Mississippians had left the program within a 12-month period. Those figures are statewide rather than specific to Harrison County, but they show the direction of travel for owners renewing coverage.
Community participation in FEMA’s Community Rating System (CRS) can soften the cost. Biloxi held a CRS Class 6 rating in 2024, which brings a 20% discount on eligible NFIP premiums, according to the Mississippi-Alabama Sea Grant Consortium, which helped the city retain it. Ratings are reviewed periodically, so owners should check FEMA’s current list for the class that applies at renewal, and Gulfport owners should confirm their own city’s status rather than assume the same discount.
Practical flood steps for owners
Flood cost depends heavily on the building itself. Owners can:
- Pull the current flood zone and an elevation certificate for each building.
- Compare NFIP and private flood quotes, since private carriers price some Coast properties differently.
- Ask whether any mitigation work, such as elevating mechanical equipment, changes the rating.
- Budget for the possibility that a lender requires coverage even outside a high-risk zone.
Water, sewer and electricity
Utilities on the Coast are moving up, led by water and sewer.
Biloxi’s proposed water and sewer increases
In October 2026, Biloxi presented proposed Biloxi water and sewer rate increases of 30% to 50% for average residential customers and 17% for high-volume users such as businesses, with sewer rates rising as well. As of mid-October 2026, the council vote was still pending. For an apartment building on a master meter, the high-volume category is the one to watch; for buildings with individually metered units where tenants pay directly, the increase lands first on renters and indirectly on the owner through affordability and turnover.
Gulfport’s published schedules
Gulfport publishes separate residential and commercial water and sewer rate schedules for customers inside city limits, posted as effective October 1, 2022. With $26 million in water and sewer improvements in the fiscal 2026 budget, owners should check the city’s current schedule rather than relying on older bills when projecting future costs. Comparing the residential and commercial schedules is also worth the effort, because a master-metered apartment building may not be billed the same way as a single-family home.
Electricity
Mississippi Power, a Southern Company subsidiary headquartered in Gulfport, serves 23 counties in southeastern Mississippi and had 191,678 customers as of December 31, 2022, according to its SEC filings. For most apartment buildings, tenants pay for in-unit electricity, and the owner’s exposure is limited to common areas, exterior lighting, laundry rooms and any master-metered systems. Energy upgrades in those areas, such as LED exterior lighting or more efficient laundry equipment, show their savings directly in this line, since it is one of the few utility costs that stays with the owner in most buildings.
Building codes and rental inspections
Code requirements set the floor for capital spending. Biloxi adopted applicable portions of the 2024 International Building Code through Ordinance No. 2583 in 2025. Gulfport said in April 2026 that it plans to update its residential construction codes, though it had not set a timeline. Newer codes generally matter most when an owner undertakes substantial renovation or rebuilds after storm damage, because that is when current standards apply to the work.
Neither city appears to operate a citywide rental registration or routine rental inspection program for apartments, based on a review of each city’s published materials. That keeps a recurring compliance cost off the budget that owners in many other states carry, but owners should still confirm with each city’s code enforcement office, since requirements can change and complaint-driven inspections still apply.
What Gulfport and Biloxi apartment operating costs mean for owners
Taken together, the cost picture on the Coast rewards owners who budget conservatively and document their buildings well:
- Budget taxes at the Class II ratio. Use 15% of true value and the current combined millage for the parcel, and add the Class III personal property bill.
- Plan for insurance volatility. Price wind and flood separately, understand named-storm deductibles, and set aside reserves for the deductible as well as the premium.
- Watch utility votes. Biloxi’s water and sewer decision and Gulfport’s capital program will flow through to master-metered buildings first.
- Fund mitigation privately. State roof grants exclude rentals, so any FORTIFIED or wind-mitigation upgrade is an owner-funded capital decision.
- Track the calendar. Millage is set in September for an October 1 fiscal year, and knowing each policy’s renewal date well ahead of hurricane season leaves time to shop coverage.
Expenses on the Coast weigh directly on value, because buyers capitalize the net operating income that remains after them. Our NOI calculator is a quick way to see how a change in the insurance or tax line affects a building’s income. For more on the local market, see our Gulfport–Biloxi market page and our Mississippi markets overview.
Budgeting for the year ahead
The next twelve months bring several known decision points. Biloxi’s council will decide on water and sewer rates. Harrison County, Gulfport and Biloxi will set millage again in September 2027 for the following fiscal year. The Insurance Department’s statewide expansion of Strengthen Mississippi Homes is expected in early 2027, and while it does not cover apartments, it may shift how carriers and the wind pool treat mitigated homes along the same streets. Owners who build their budget around those dates, rather than last year’s bills, will be in the best position to keep Gulfport and Biloxi buildings running profitably through each hurricane season.
