I present my own case on the market distorting effects of Prop 13. I purchased a house in San Diego in 2003. Many of my neighbors are original owners or children of the original owners (more on that in a moment) who purchased their homes in the early sixties, when homes were less than 10% of their current value in many neighborhoods. Because of Prop 13, I pay more than 10 times what those folks pay in annual property taxes. In seven years, I have paid more in taxes than they have in nearly fifty years. In just a few years I will have paid double, and within ten years I will have paid triple, and it only gets worse from there.
People are encouraged by this economic distortion to stay in their homes as long as possible. The legislature also passed two other propositions that allow you to 1. sell your house and take your tax basis with you to another property (one time exemption), and 2. bequeath your tax basis along with your house to your children. Effectively, Californians who were lucky enough to own property in the Golden State before the recent property boom (and maintain a property in California) are largely exempt from property taxes. Why is California protecting one class of citizens over others? So why does it matter? Property taxes fund roads, schools, and other basic infrastructure of a neighborhood. My neighborhood and many others around the state are frozen in time, unable to raise funds to modernize schools, repave roads, and maintain infrastructure. Now that the state faces a budget crisis of epic proportions, we need to phase out Prop 13 and increase revenues from property taxes in these older neighborhoods, because they do nothing but drain money from the coffers. Oh, and the kicker is that these are the same retired people who I used to see at the local Starbucks who would tell me to hurry on to work and earn their Social Security checks for them, knowing full well that the federal system is going broke too, but not caring because they will likely be dead once it collapses. Ha, not so lucky, bitches! So back to the marijuana debate, yes, street prices are apparently in free fall because of medical marijuana, and it is ravaging the local economy in northern California. When Californians vote on legalized marijuana in November, those counties will almost certainly vote no by a large margin. Talk about the distorting effects of a policy- the most prolific growers in the U.S. are going to vote against legalization in order to maximize profits. On Sun, May 16, 2010 at 5:08 PM, Cameron Childress <[email protected]> wrote: > > On Sun, May 16, 2010 at 7:18 PM, Dana <[email protected]> wrote: >> ah. perhaps. > > If you buy a house identical to your next door neighbor, with an > identical valuation, you are going to be paying more property taxes > then they are. Sometimes exponentially more. > > There is real reason this think that if Prop 13 never existed, > California would not have a budget crisis right now at all. > > http://repealprop13.org/ > > -Camero ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Order the Adobe Coldfusion Anthology now! http://www.amazon.com/Adobe-Coldfusion-Anthology-Michael-Dinowitz/dp/1430272155/?tag=houseoffusion Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:318676 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/unsubscribe.cfm
