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Tesla’s headquarters will move to Austin

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Re: Tesla’s headquarters will move to Austin

#411

Post by bgentry »

scoofy wrote: post #307
minhazm wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google maps says downtown Austin to Giga Texas is 17 miles, 24 minutes. I don't know what traffic is like in Austin but I imagine it's not nearly as bad as the bay area. I think a 25-30 min commute is pretty reasonable and most people would happily take that for much cheaper housing. The big difference is that in Austin you have the option to commute a bit for much cheaper housing. But in the bay area you could be co…

Traffic in Austin is insane. Legit insane. Definitely comparable to the Bay Area if not worse. And there is absolutely no transit alternative comparable to BART. There is a morning and evening train, but it's really only effective if you live and work exactly on the stops.

I lived in CA my whole life, including the last 10 years in the Bay Area, before moving to Austin a year ago. I can’t for the life of me understand what you’re talking about.

I-35 is bad, that’s about it. The freeways around the rest of Austin are still moving even around rush hour. None of those hold a candle to the Bay Bridge on a Friday afternoon, not even remotely close to as bad.

Re: Tesla’s headquarters will move to Austin

#412

Post by achenatx »

thebradbain wrote: post #179
asdff wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Property taxes are higher than California, right? I can't find the source handy at the moment, but I've heard that a house in Austin that looks like a couple hundred grand cheaper than an equivalent house in California for the listing isn't actually any cheaper when you factor in the increased taxes and potentially other costs I'm not aware of.

Property taxes are _much_ higher in Texas than California, in fact Texas has one of the highest property taxes in the nation (because there's no income tax, and TX still needs to fund itself somehow; TX also has one of the highest sales taxes for this reason, too). You pay the same on property taxes for a $400k house in Texas as a $1M house in California. Not only that, CA has Prop 13: for better or worse, your prope…

homesteads are capped at 10% increase in valuation. City budgets are capped at 3.5% without a vote.

The largest share of property taxes is actually school districts which run roughly 50% of the property tax in austin. The city is 25% and the other 25% is the county, health district, and community college.

Tax rates float. If the valuations double, but the taxing entity budgets stay the same, then the tax rate will drop in half.

Rising valuations dont have much to do with the increase in taxes over time.

Re: Tesla’s headquarters will move to Austin

#413

Post by rcpt »

asdff wrote: post #159
etchalon wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who just bought a house in Austin this year, if the reason is "affordable housing", they're in for a world of hurt.

Property taxes are higher than California, right? I can't find the source handy at the moment, but I've heard that a house in Austin that looks like a couple hundred grand cheaper than an equivalent house in California for the listing isn't actually any cheaper when you factor in the increased taxes and potentially other costs I'm not aware of.

https://www.taxfairnessproject.org

Arguably taxes are higher for newcomers. Yes rates are lower but purchase price is insane. But Native Sons of the Golden West pay pennies on the dollar in property tax. Old businesses to. It's a $30B per year tax cut to successful real estate investors. That's 3x the size of the NSF and several billion more than NASA.

This is the root of all California's problems. Underfunded schools, endless sprawl, state parks closing, crumbling infrastructure and rampant housing speculation. It's all because of Prop 13.

Re: Tesla’s headquarters will move to Austin

#415

Post by jdavis703 »

oceanplexian wrote: post #383
pvarangot wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I talked to several Tesla and former Tesla folks that will probably relocate because of this, and the say is that since Austin in less NIMBY than the Bay Area new housing will get built and prices will go down. It's a more complex bet than just "we move there because houses are affordable now".

It’s a no brainer, my company offered to let me move out of CA a few years ago. My utilities are 50% cheaper and more reliable, crime is lower, the air quality is better, and I bought a new construction with 10G Fiber Internet (You will never get this in California due to failing infrastructure). I miss is the arts, culture, and nightlife, but that was wiped out by government-enacted COVID restrictions so there are f…

I don’t know where in CA you were… But here in Oakland I have the option for 10G fiber (albeit the landlord only wired my actual apartment for 1G ethernet, but the fiber is like 50 feet from my door). Utilities are extremely low… Far lower than I had to deal with winter and summers in the US South. And at least so far, this year air quality hasn’t yet entered in to the toxic level.

Re: Tesla’s headquarters will move to Austin

#416

Post by [deleted] »

thebradbain wrote: post #327
boringg wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel for everyone as the prices are getting stupid everywhere.... BUTTTT I just looked on Redfin - I could buy a 3300 square foot house in Austin for under $900k with a huge pool and that was a 5 second search. No offense all you Austin folk, but you literally have no clue.

Taxes for that home in TX would be equivalent to a $1.8M+ home in CA, though (and raise every year with the market), so it's not as simple as comparison. The monthly mortgage payment for a $900k in Austin is probably comparable to a $1.2-1.3M home in CA.

[deleted]

Re: Tesla’s headquarters will move to Austin

#417

Post by muzz »

Omniusaspirer wrote: post #392
muzz wrote: post #335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A decade ago, I owned a 200k house in Austin while making a 6-figure salary in California-- I paid more in property taxes on the house in Austin than I did on income taxes on my income in California.

This is really only the case if you had substantial deductions of some sort. Assuming you made exactly 100k as a nice lowball you'd have owed $6947.92 in 2011 California income taxes. Harder to quickly find 2011 Austin property taxes but using todays rates without the homestead exemption you would have paid $4653 presuming you lived in Austin proper with Austin ISD taxes. This is obvious a simplified calculation assu…

No homestead exemption. Roughly 3.1% tax rate. Northwest corner of Austin, in the 78717 zip code. Leander ISD if I recall correctly.

California taxes were affected by CA deduction, CA personal exemption, and 401k (which I didn't max out, and even without it I think the original claim still stands although just barely)

Re: Tesla’s headquarters will move to Austin

#418

Post by rcpt »

chipotle_coyote wrote: post #273
Apocryphon wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> FWIW, I'm looking at FL now instead. Miami? Or joining the much more quiet Jacksonville or Tampa Bay exodus that this dubious survey based entirely on LinkedIn data claims: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-06-01/austin-is...

As someone who used to live in Tampa Bay—and may have to move back for family reasons next year—I find that a little dubious as well. :) Although to be fair, Tampa and St. Petersburg both got measurably more interesting in the last decade than they were when I left in 2002. Never lived in Jacksonville, but I’ve visited it and have a friend who used to live there. Jacksonville is to Florida what Fresno is to Californi…

St Petersburg is nice. Amazing beaches and kitesurfing at fort desoto, plenty of water access for boating and sailing, generally out of the path of hurricanes. Not much in the way of universities to recruit from though.

Re: Tesla’s headquarters will move to Austin

#419

Post by FormerBandmate »

gautamcgoel wrote: post #48

What I'm really curious about is what happens to Austin (and to a lesser extent, Atlanta, Raleigh, Denver, SLC etc). Does Austin become the next Bay Area/next Seattle? Crazy high housing prices, and high homelessness/crime? If so, how long does that take, and what happens to native Austinites? If not, what prevents history from repeating itself?

Homelessness isn’t really caused by housing prices, people just move to worse places or get roommates. Crime definitely isn’t caused by housing prices, it’s plunged as housing prices have soared over the past 30 years

Re: Tesla’s headquarters will move to Austin

#420

Post by rcpt »

philwelch wrote: post #202
zeruch wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a PR move to cow CA politicians to be more amenable to C-suites without challenge. It's theater. Petty, obstinate, twattish theater.

Those poor, powerless, persecuted politicians.

To be fair California politicians have no say over voters power of direct democracy. It's why we have prop 13 and thus why our housing market is a nightmare.
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