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California Property Taxes Mapped

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Re: California Property Taxes Mapped

#41

Post by jedberg »

On my block we have five nearly identical houses. My house, which I bought 12 years ago, my neighbors house, which they have been in for 22 years, my other neighbor, who has been there 45+ years, the neighbor two over who bought about five years ago, and the neighbor two over the other way who bought two weeks ago.

If my tax bill is X, the rates are as follows, for nearly identical houses, all valued nearly the same on Zillow/Redfin:

    2.3X
    0.4X
    1.0X
    0.1X
    2.0X
The two lowest payers don't have kids in school, so an argument could be made for them to have slightly lower taxes, but they still use the police, fire department, parks, and they have access to the senior center, which I do not.

The rest of us have kids roughly the same age.

So basically the people who just moved in are subsidizing the rest of us significantly.

It's completely unfair.

Re: California Property Taxes Mapped

#42

Post by arrosenberg »

twblalock wrote: post #16
creato wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Property taxes going up would be a negative feedback on property values. Perhaps part of why property values are so absurdly high is because there is little incentive to sell, which would add more supply to the market

There is actually a negative incentive to sell, because your property taxes will almost certainly go up if you buy another home. It's gotten to the point that we have ballot amendments carving out exceptions for senior citizens, so they can take their old property tax rates with them when they buy new homes, but only if they move between certain counties that have a reciprocity agreement, blah blah blah. Clearly not…

> It's gotten to the point that we have ballot amendments carving out exceptions for senior citizens, so they can take their old property tax rates with them when they buy new homes, but only if they move between certain counties that have a reciprocity agreement, blah blah blah. Clearly not the kind of policy a sane system would result in.

And there is another ballot prop on this years' ballot (prop 19) being pushed by the Realtors' Assc. to expand the '86 law to include all properties within the state, rather than just county, and to cover up to 3 moves instead of 1.

Re: California Property Taxes Mapped

#43

Post by mehrdadn »

refurb wrote: post #40
mehrdadn wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not exactly hard to imagine what problems occur here. You spend a huge chunk of your life saving to buy a home, and you plan it so that you can pay the taxes on it when you retire, then the rest of the city forces you to "enjoy" higher taxes you never demanded, predicted, or wanted, based on an income stream that you no longer have to pay it with, suddenly driving you out of the home/neighborhood/town you worked…

What’s really unfair is someone whose home goes from $100k to $2M, for a total capital gain of $1.9M gets a 90% discount on their property taxes. The people with the greatest ability to pay are the ones getting the biggest tax break.

Yes, as I mentioned, there are indeed two sides to the argument.

Re: California Property Taxes Mapped

#44

Post by babesh »

twblalock wrote: post #38
babesh wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are already flat taxes per parcel. So you are taxing an owner of a rental on their total income rather than the income they earn on the property?

No, I'm proposing taxing city residents on their income regardless of whether they own or rent. If the owner of the parcel doesn't live in the city then he wouldn't pay a dime of income tax to the city -- he would pay the parcel tax to the city where the parcel is located, and he would pay income tax wherever he lives.

Time for the international buyers to buy housing en masse, rent it out, and not pay your income tax. The renters would be stuck paying the income tax and the international buyers would just pay the parcel tax. So renters would be stuck paying for rent and an additional income tax for renting. Hahahahaha.

Re: California Property Taxes Mapped

#45

Post by majormajor »

ladberg wrote: post #37
mehrdadn wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not exactly hard to imagine what problems occur here. You spend a huge chunk of your life saving to buy a home, and you plan it so that you can pay the taxes on it when you retire, then the rest of the city forces you to "enjoy" higher taxes you never demanded, predicted, or wanted, based on an income stream that you no longer have to pay it with, suddenly driving you out of the home/neighborhood/town you worked…

Then you can just sell your house and buy another one in a less expensive area and make insane profits. The people who support prop 13 are literally lottery winners who are complaining about paying taxes on their winnings. If you don't want to move then you can get a reverse mortgage and still profit, you just won't get to pass the house to your children. Still, you'll make way more from the property value increases…

"Congrats, you have won the lottery, now you have to move somewhere way cheaper - probably because it doesn't have many of the features that drew you here in the first place!"

"All because a bunch of people with more money than you are now willing to pay a bunch of money for your neighbors' places."

I think laws and policy should exactly be focused on protecting those who have less from the impact of those who have more. Not because they're morally superior or anything, but just to try to keep things balanced because the people with the money already enjoy so many other advantages.

Moving is hugely disruptive to people's life, so the ability to plan expenses - both for property tax and in terms of rent control - has a lot of non-financial appeal as a policy. "Make people move when folks with more cash want to come in" is at best a somewhat heartless position, and at worse a major driver of homelessness.

Re: California Property Taxes Mapped

#46

Post by twblalock »

babesh wrote: post #44
twblalock wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, I'm proposing taxing city residents on their income regardless of whether they own or rent. If the owner of the parcel doesn't live in the city then he wouldn't pay a dime of income tax to the city -- he would pay the parcel tax to the city where the parcel is located, and he would pay income tax wherever he lives.

Time for the international buyers to buy housing en masse, rent it out, and not pay your income tax. The renters would be stuck paying the income tax and the international buyers would just pay the parcel tax. So renters would be stuck paying for rent and an additional income tax for renting. Hahahahaha.

That's fine, they will pay the parcel tax and their tenants will pay income tax.

It seems wrong to me to make someone pay tax where they do not live. It's not like the owners of rental homes are the people who use the city services -- the people who live in the homes do, and they should pay for them.

Re: California Property Taxes Mapped

#47

Post by geomark »

roenxi wrote: post #12
seiferteric wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Counterpoint: Why should your property taxes go up just because the market around you skyrockets, when this is completely outside of your control? The bay area is a prime example of this.

Because the money is being used to pay for local services that "you" are enjoying. Someone has to pay the taxes. It is difficult to see a good argument that having been a landholder for a long time gives some sort of moral right to be supported by others.

Pretty sure that when tax payments skyrocket the quality of services do not. As per parent comment, the bay area is a good example.

Re: California Property Taxes Mapped

#48

Post by arrosenberg »

Enginerrrd wrote: post #39
georgeecollins wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1) One of the reasons why prices skyrocket is because people who would feel the pinch of the rising prices and probably move, don't. 2) Nobody has the right to own an asset for pennies on the dollar indefinitely. Because property tax rates are heritable and transferable geographically (once you reach a certain age and only in certain counties) you are creating a tax advantaged class of people in California.

>2) Nobody has the right to own an asset for pennies on the dollar indefinitely That's a ridiculus assertion. When I buy something, having paid income tax and the government gets paid the taxes on the sale, why should I have to permenantly rent that item from the government? If that logic applied to you car and computer and clothes, and prized heirlooms from your family, I think you'd object. Thats a fundamental assa…

> That's a ridiculus assertion. When I buy something, having paid income tax and the government gets paid the taxes on the sale, why should I have to permenantly rent that item from the government?

Upkeep != Rent. The government uses that money to pay for the roads and services, mainly police and fire (you know, the people who protect your property).

Re: California Property Taxes Mapped

#49

Post by rrdharan »

Enginerrrd wrote: post #39
georgeecollins wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1) One of the reasons why prices skyrocket is because people who would feel the pinch of the rising prices and probably move, don't. 2) Nobody has the right to own an asset for pennies on the dollar indefinitely. Because property tax rates are heritable and transferable geographically (once you reach a certain age and only in certain counties) you are creating a tax advantaged class of people in California.

>2) Nobody has the right to own an asset for pennies on the dollar indefinitely That's a ridiculus assertion. When I buy something, having paid income tax and the government gets paid the taxes on the sale, why should I have to permenantly rent that item from the government? If that logic applied to you car and computer and clothes, and prized heirlooms from your family, I think you'd object. Thats a fundamental assa…

There are actually a number of people who draw the distinction between possessions and land exactly that way. I.e. the argument would be that land ownership should never be allowed.

It’s not an immediately farcical concept from first principles.

Re: California Property Taxes Mapped

#50

Post by mehrdadn »

leetcrew wrote: post #34
mehrdadn wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not exactly hard to imagine what problems occur here. You spend a huge chunk of your life saving to buy a home, and you plan it so that you can pay the taxes on it when you retire, then the rest of the city forces you to "enjoy" higher taxes you never demanded, predicted, or wanted, based on an income stream that you no longer have to pay it with, suddenly driving you out of the home/neighborhood/town you worked…

fortunately there is a financial instrument for exactly this situation: the reverse mortgage. it's kind of absurd to treat the quintupling in value of one's home as some sort of hardship.

Unfortunately even the intro on Wikipedia explains some problems with reverse mortgages.

Not to mention that it's kind of a lot to force, idk, 80-year-olds to take out reverse mortgages just so they can keep living in homes they've already paid for and own. Though I guess it's not surprising if people half their age don't care about their burden.

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