Spend it or send it back: refund deadlines by state

The rule

A majority of state enabling acts require impact fee revenue to be spent within a specified number of years or refunded to the payer. The windows range from five to fifteen years, with six years the single most common figure.

Jurisdictions must track payments and expenditures on a first-in, first-out basis to administer this. That accounting exists and is public.

Why refunds almost never happen

The compilation is blunt about it: refunds due to failure to spend within the required period are rare in practice. Not because the money always gets spent on time, but because the right sits with a payer who has usually moved on, sold the house, and never calendared the date.

The refund is generally owed to the current owner of the property at the time of payment, and in several acts it must include interest earned.

The unusual variants worth knowing

Arizona ties a refund to cost overruns in reverse: if the completed facility came in more than ten percent under the forecast the fee was based on, the current owner can claim the difference.

South Carolina words the trigger by schedule rather than by payment date, requiring a refund if fees were not spent within three years of when they were scheduled to be spent.

Rhode Island exempts the recoupment portion of a fee from its eight-year clock, which is logically correct: recoupment pays for capacity that already exists, so there is nothing to build.

Arizona also has a longer window for water and wastewater, fifteen years rather than ten.

What to actually do

Note the date you paid, the fee category, and your state's window. Put a reminder at the end of it. Then request the fund accounting for that category and service area, and ask what was spent and when.

The request costs a stamp. The claim is either there or it is not, and you will be one of very few people who checked.