7 ms·

Awww poor baby. You’ve made more than $500K, much of which will be untaxed, simply by owning a house. Jesus fucking Christ. Cry me a river. Most people would tr

by ttul 9y ago

Awww poor baby. You’ve made more than $500K, much of which will be untaxed, simply by owning a house. Jesus fucking Christ. Cry me a river. Most people would trade their arm in for that kind of leveraged gain.

el_benhameen 9y ago
You arguably have a point (so does the parent), but this isn’t the way to express it in a respectful discussion.
- dalacv 9y ago
  But does ttul really get his point across at how he really feels without the colorful words?
  - grzm 9y ago
    Likely they could. "Colorful words" are often used to elicit an emotional response, and emotion can significantly impair one's ability to self-reflect and remove bias. If the goal is civil, substantive discourse (as is the goal of HN), all parties involved need to keep this in mind when commenting. That does take additional effort, but it's worth it to keep HN one of the better places to engage on the internet.
- Danihan 9y ago
  I dislike the notion that discourse needs to be respectful at all times. Discourse shouldn't be baselessly disrespectful, sure. But the robotic, tsk tsk, shaming attitude that gets thrown around on forums whenever someone expresses any negative emotion gets old too. In any case, complaining about having to pay capital gains tax on gains OVER $500k really is the ultimate first world, privileged problem.
  - chaostheory 9y ago
    Maybe if the comment added to the conversation somehow it'd be more tolerable. However, all the comment does is insult someone without adding anything interesting. It's a waste of space and time for everyone else reading it. It doesn't belong in HN.
    - Danihan 9y ago
      Expressing incredulity and frustration at the obtuseness of someone's complaint doesn't seem especially useless to me. Why is expressing emotional reactions pointless, in your mind? Doing so gives everyone more information about the reactions they might expect to their concerns... it enforces social norms, etc.
      - chaostheory 9y ago
        > Why is expressing emotional reactions pointless, in your mind? Doing so gives everyone more information about the reactions they might expect to their concerns The problem is that the comment provides nothing else. You can do the same thing in a more civil and constructive way. Just look at your comments. You are providing logic and rationale for your argument. I don't agree with you, but you're adding to the discussion. Now compare that to "I'm sick of you people. Stop whining about other people's comments you big baby". Someone can correct me, but that doesn't belong here and that rule has been around since the beginning of HN. It's been written and clear along with the reasons why. It's the way things have been done here. If someone doesn't like it, they can post on reddit instead. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html "Be civil. Don't say things you wouldn't say face-to-face. Don't be snarky. Comments should get more civil and substantive, not less, as a topic gets more divisive. When disagreeing, please reply to the argument instead of calling names. 'That is idiotic; 1 + 1 is 2, not 3' can be shortened to '1 + 1 is 2, not 3.'"
        Danihan 9y ago
        I don't disagree that the comment is probably against the rules. I just believe the rules tend to stifle people from expressing how they truly feel about topics, and are therefore information limiting and generally a net loss. It's a fine line. Some people's feelings are toxic all the time and wrong-headed and truly add nothing of value. Other people, when they have a negative emotional reaction there is probably a lot of accumulated wisdom behind it and you should really listen instead of censoring or rambling on about civility. Very subjective though. Also, in my opinion, the constant suppression of any negative speech is exactly what gets someone like Trump elected. "Finally, someone on TV is saying what I FEEL and no one can stop him!"
  - grzm 9y ago
    I think you have a point. It depends on context. Within the context of HN, you at least have to be civil. Civility and respect are not exactly equivalent, but they're quite close.
  - davidw 9y ago
    It's not about a "negative emotion", it's about saying something that you probably wouldn't say to someone's face. If I were talking to lisper over a beer, I'd probably smile and say that that problem is one that 99% of the world's population would love to have, or something to that effect. Or maybe without the smile and straight to the point "complaining about profits so high that you're getting taxed on them when there are people who are homeless is not a great look". OTOH, I don't think he's really complaining, just pointing out that the system is pretty screwy even for someone who is in no uncertain terms doing pretty well.
  - darawk 9y ago
    > In any case, complaining about having to pay capital gains tax on gains OVER $500k really is the ultimate first world, privileged problem. Almost every complaint levied on this forum is a first world problem. Complaining about the ergonomics of a programming language is a first world problem. And secondly, he wasn't complaining, he was describing the economics of his choices. What is infinitely more toxic than 'complaining' about first world problems, is people jumping on explanations like the above as 'complaints' that need to be silenced.
    - Danihan 9y ago
      >What is infinitely more toxic than 'complaining' about first world problems That's just like, your opinion man. >Complaining about the ergonomics Look, complaining about work is a typical first world problem, sure. And of course we're all lucky to do the work we do and not live in [wherever.] Complaining about 20% taxes on $200k of a ~$700k windfall is truly more like a .00001% issue and is pretty obtuse by any measure. You wouldn't raise an eyebrow, or have any negative reaction to someone making $400k / year bitterly complaining that they have to pay taxes on it? I don't know anyone who wouldn't think that was obnoxious. >he was describing the economics of his choices. Sort of, in a fairly facile and borderline deceptive manner.
      - darawk 9y ago
        > You wouldn't raise an eyebrow, or have any negative reaction to someone making $400k / year bitterly complaining that they have to pay taxes on it? I don't know anyone who wouldn't think that was obnoxious. Where are these bitter complaints? He commented to say that rising housing prices weren't good for him. He explained why. That isn't a complaint. He didn't say "I deserve this money from my rising house price!". He didn't say "the world is so unfair to me". He just explained why this thing that people thought would be helpful to someone like him, was in fact, not helpful. > Sort of, in a fairly facile and borderline deceptive manner. What was facile or deceptive about what he said? He's absolutely correct.
        Danihan 9y ago
  - el_benhameen 9y ago
    I agree that we don't need to be robotically respectful. If someone's a real asshole, I have no qualms with responding in kind, even if doing so is debatably effective. I wrote what I wrote because I thought that ttul's comment was baselessly disrespectful. The parent wasn't being a jerk, but ttul responded with out of place ad hominem attacks instead of addressing the argument.
rebuilder 9y ago
That's purely a paper profit. As the parent said, they can't afford to move to a similar apartment, so they're unwilling to sell. That probably goes for a lot of other homeowners in the area, which seems likely to contribute further to higher prices. Seems pretty dysfunctional to me.
lisper 9y ago
I'm not asking anyone to feel sorry for us. I'm just pointing out that rising prices are not a panacea for owner-occupied primary residences. The result is bad for everyone because people like us end up staying in houses that are too big. That takes housing stock off the market and drives prices up even further. That's good for investors, but bad for everyone who wants to buy a house to live in.
- stevehawk 9y ago
  Let's say the house didn't go up in value.. where would that leave you? Would you be any more capable to sell? (Serious question, not a rhetorical or sarcastic one.. just seems to me you'd still be in a hole, just a different hole)
  - jblow 9y ago
    The hole would be smaller, thus more likely to be affordable with wages / savings / etc.
  - bzbarsky 9y ago
    > Would you be any more capable to sell? Quite possibly, yes. Let's plug in some plausible numbers. Say someone buys a 3-bedroom house for $300k (they have kids). At the same time, 1-bedroom houses sell for $200k. Time passes, the kids grow up and move out. Say house prices didn't change at all. You sell for $300k, buy for $200k, pay some agent fees, have $85k or so left over. Now say prices went up and the 3-bedroom house is $1,500,000. You sell, have a $1.2e6 capital gain. $500k is deductible, you pay taxes on the remaining $700k. That's taxed at 20% federal plus the ACA 3.8% investment income tax (because your income is way over that boundary) plus state capital gains taxes. In California, capital gains are taxed the same as other income, at first glance; let's be charitable and assume you avoid the higher tax brackets (12.3%) and get taxed at an effective 10% here. That's 33.8% tax. So your after-tax sale proceeds are $500k + 0.662*$700k = $963k. Note that your house went up in price by 5x. If the smaller one did too, it costs $1 million and you can't pay for it anymore. If it went up by more than that (e.g. if the primary inflation was in land prices, which it often is) you might be even more in the hole. Things are even worse if you're trying to sell and buy something equivalent instead of downsizing.
yawz 9y ago
> You’ve made more than $500K Nope! This is all speculative until you need to "sell & move". If you want to move to another place in the same area, guess what, you've probably made nothing. With all the taxes and fees that you have to pay on the sale price you can't buy the equivalent of your house. You can only capitalize on that appreciation if you move somewhere considerably cheaper. Not only that, the owner faces higher (in some cases much higher) property taxes due to increasing house prices, which is totally out of their control. I'm not suggesting that they're in a bad spot. It's just not the "jackpot" that your post is suggesting.
- mbesto 9y ago
  > With all the taxes and fees that you have to pay on the sale price you can't buy the equivalent of your house. So why on earth would someone want to sell their house and buy an equivalent house in the same area...?
  - ghaff 9y ago
    In all fairness, I can see wanting to, say, downsize and move to a more walkable community relatively nearby. (Or, for that matter, move out of an expensive urban condo and move somewhere with more room--although that will harder in the Bay area specifically.) To the degree that market value of the two is similar, the financial hit will be substantial. But a lot of this is true with moving generally when you're living somewhere that's OK but isn't really optimal for you any longer.
  - nitrogen 9y ago
    Switch schools or districts, change neighbors, move closer to work, change floorplans, move closer to family, etc.
    - sliverstorm 9y ago
      In short, what is important to people in their residence changes. Friend of mine bought a house he and his wife loved. Five years later he came to understand what owning a Dr Horton house means, and they wanted a better-built house.
astura 9y ago
Except you can really only "cash out" in a meaningful way if you sell and relocate to a cheaper area/somewhere without a housing bubble, which is extremely disruptive to your life.
- ZeroGravitas 9y ago
  There are financial instruments that will allow you to cash out if you own property while continuing to live in it for as long as you want to e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverse_mortgage https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverse_mortgage
  - astura 9y ago
    I said "in a meaningful way."
BatFastard 9y ago
I am the only one not seeing "reply" links on some of these posts? I see others of the same depth with reply links... Edit: Actually it's just the one from davidw
- astura 9y ago
  HN has rate limiting on replies. Reply button should appear after a few minutes.
sliverstorm 9y ago
Suppose they move horizontally to a similar house. I don't know, they want one story instead of two. Since a rising tide lifts all boats, the new purchase is about even with the old sale- but they also owe taxes. So within this window, they are objectively worse off than your average Joe who can move across town without owning those taxes. Anyone trading up is also impacted as well. Suppose you bought a condo at 100k, and SFH was 200k. In five years you want to trade up, but the market went up 100%. Your condo sells for 200k, but the SFH costs 400k. Despite the lovely appreciation on your condo, you'd probably prefer if the market hadn't moved. Sure, there's people who have it worse. Owning any home at all puts them in better shape than most of the world. But it's still not enviable to be unable to move within your community.
losteverything 9y ago
These comments are helpful because this is how people think. When a suit or Talbots customer argues over a price at Wal-Mart you should hear the similar type of tone the cashier takes after they leave. Especially if they argue for a buck or two. This is real world
sctb 9y ago
It doesn't matter what you're responding to; the guidelines ask us not to post like this. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

by ttul 9y ago

el_benhameen 9y ago

You arguably have a point (so does the parent), but this isn’t the way to express it in a respectful discussion.

dalacv 9y ago
But does ttul really get his point across at how he really feels without the colorful words?
- grzm 9y ago
  Likely they could. "Colorful words" are often used to elicit an emotional response, and emotion can significantly impair one's ability to self-reflect and remove bias. If the goal is civil, substantive discourse (as is the goal of HN), all parties involved need to keep this in mind when commenting. That does take additional effort, but it's worth it to keep HN one of the better places to engage on the internet.
Danihan 9y ago
I dislike the notion that discourse needs to be respectful at all times. Discourse shouldn't be baselessly disrespectful, sure. But the robotic, tsk tsk, shaming attitude that gets thrown around on forums whenever someone expresses any negative emotion gets old too. In any case, complaining about having to pay capital gains tax on gains OVER $500k really is the ultimate first world, privileged problem.
- chaostheory 9y ago
  Maybe if the comment added to the conversation somehow it'd be more tolerable. However, all the comment does is insult someone without adding anything interesting. It's a waste of space and time for everyone else reading it. It doesn't belong in HN.
  - Danihan 9y ago
    Expressing incredulity and frustration at the obtuseness of someone's complaint doesn't seem especially useless to me. Why is expressing emotional reactions pointless, in your mind? Doing so gives everyone more information about the reactions they might expect to their concerns... it enforces social norms, etc.
    - chaostheory 9y ago
      > Why is expressing emotional reactions pointless, in your mind? Doing so gives everyone more information about the reactions they might expect to their concerns The problem is that the comment provides nothing else. You can do the same thing in a more civil and constructive way. Just look at your comments. You are providing logic and rationale for your argument. I don't agree with you, but you're adding to the discussion. Now compare that to "I'm sick of you people. Stop whining about other people's comments you big baby". Someone can correct me, but that doesn't belong here and that rule has been around since the beginning of HN. It's been written and clear along with the reasons why. It's the way things have been done here. If someone doesn't like it, they can post on reddit instead. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html "Be civil. Don't say things you wouldn't say face-to-face. Don't be snarky. Comments should get more civil and substantive, not less, as a topic gets more divisive. When disagreeing, please reply to the argument instead of calling names. 'That is idiotic; 1 + 1 is 2, not 3' can be shortened to '1 + 1 is 2, not 3.'"
      - Danihan 9y ago
        I don't disagree that the comment is probably against the rules. I just believe the rules tend to stifle people from expressing how they truly feel about topics, and are therefore information limiting and generally a net loss. It's a fine line. Some people's feelings are toxic all the time and wrong-headed and truly add nothing of value. Other people, when they have a negative emotional reaction there is probably a lot of accumulated wisdom behind it and you should really listen instead of censoring or rambling on about civility. Very subjective though. Also, in my opinion, the constant suppression of any negative speech is exactly what gets someone like Trump elected. "Finally, someone on TV is saying what I FEEL and no one can stop him!"
- grzm 9y ago
  I think you have a point. It depends on context. Within the context of HN, you at least have to be civil. Civility and respect are not exactly equivalent, but they're quite close.
- davidw 9y ago
  It's not about a "negative emotion", it's about saying something that you probably wouldn't say to someone's face. If I were talking to lisper over a beer, I'd probably smile and say that that problem is one that 99% of the world's population would love to have, or something to that effect. Or maybe without the smile and straight to the point "complaining about profits so high that you're getting taxed on them when there are people who are homeless is not a great look". OTOH, I don't think he's really complaining, just pointing out that the system is pretty screwy even for someone who is in no uncertain terms doing pretty well.
- darawk 9y ago
  > In any case, complaining about having to pay capital gains tax on gains OVER $500k really is the ultimate first world, privileged problem. Almost every complaint levied on this forum is a first world problem. Complaining about the ergonomics of a programming language is a first world problem. And secondly, he wasn't complaining, he was describing the economics of his choices. What is infinitely more toxic than 'complaining' about first world problems, is people jumping on explanations like the above as 'complaints' that need to be silenced.
  - Danihan 9y ago
    >What is infinitely more toxic than 'complaining' about first world problems That's just like, your opinion man. >Complaining about the ergonomics Look, complaining about work is a typical first world problem, sure. And of course we're all lucky to do the work we do and not live in [wherever.] Complaining about 20% taxes on $200k of a ~$700k windfall is truly more like a .00001% issue and is pretty obtuse by any measure. You wouldn't raise an eyebrow, or have any negative reaction to someone making $400k / year bitterly complaining that they have to pay taxes on it? I don't know anyone who wouldn't think that was obnoxious. >he was describing the economics of his choices. Sort of, in a fairly facile and borderline deceptive manner.
    - darawk 9y ago
      > You wouldn't raise an eyebrow, or have any negative reaction to someone making $400k / year bitterly complaining that they have to pay taxes on it? I don't know anyone who wouldn't think that was obnoxious. Where are these bitter complaints? He commented to say that rising housing prices weren't good for him. He explained why. That isn't a complaint. He didn't say "I deserve this money from my rising house price!". He didn't say "the world is so unfair to me". He just explained why this thing that people thought would be helpful to someone like him, was in fact, not helpful. > Sort of, in a fairly facile and borderline deceptive manner. What was facile or deceptive about what he said? He's absolutely correct.
      - Danihan 9y ago
- el_benhameen 9y ago
  I agree that we don't need to be robotically respectful. If someone's a real asshole, I have no qualms with responding in kind, even if doing so is debatably effective. I wrote what I wrote because I thought that ttul's comment was baselessly disrespectful. The parent wasn't being a jerk, but ttul responded with out of place ad hominem attacks instead of addressing the argument.

rebuilder 9y ago

That's purely a paper profit. As the parent said, they can't afford to move to a similar apartment, so they're unwilling to sell. That probably goes for a lot of other homeowners in the area, which seems likely to contribute further to higher prices. Seems pretty dysfunctional to me.

lisper 9y ago

I'm not asking anyone to feel sorry for us. I'm just pointing out that rising prices are not a panacea for owner-occupied primary residences. The result is bad for everyone because people like us end up staying in houses that are too big. That takes housing stock off the market and drives prices up even further. That's good for investors, but bad for everyone who wants to buy a house to live in.

stevehawk 9y ago
Let's say the house didn't go up in value.. where would that leave you? Would you be any more capable to sell? (Serious question, not a rhetorical or sarcastic one.. just seems to me you'd still be in a hole, just a different hole)
- jblow 9y ago
  The hole would be smaller, thus more likely to be affordable with wages / savings / etc.
- bzbarsky 9y ago
  > Would you be any more capable to sell? Quite possibly, yes. Let's plug in some plausible numbers. Say someone buys a 3-bedroom house for $300k (they have kids). At the same time, 1-bedroom houses sell for $200k. Time passes, the kids grow up and move out. Say house prices didn't change at all. You sell for $300k, buy for $200k, pay some agent fees, have $85k or so left over. Now say prices went up and the 3-bedroom house is $1,500,000. You sell, have a $1.2e6 capital gain. $500k is deductible, you pay taxes on the remaining $700k. That's taxed at 20% federal plus the ACA 3.8% investment income tax (because your income is way over that boundary) plus state capital gains taxes. In California, capital gains are taxed the same as other income, at first glance; let's be charitable and assume you avoid the higher tax brackets (12.3%) and get taxed at an effective 10% here. That's 33.8% tax. So your after-tax sale proceeds are $500k + 0.662*$700k = $963k. Note that your house went up in price by 5x. If the smaller one did too, it costs $1 million and you can't pay for it anymore. If it went up by more than that (e.g. if the primary inflation was in land prices, which it often is) you might be even more in the hole. Things are even worse if you're trying to sell and buy something equivalent instead of downsizing.

yawz 9y ago

> You’ve made more than $500K Nope! This is all speculative until you need to "sell & move". If you want to move to another place in the same area, guess what, you've probably made nothing. With all the taxes and fees that you have to pay on the sale price you can't buy the equivalent of your house. You can only capitalize on that appreciation if you move somewhere considerably cheaper. Not only that, the owner faces higher (in some cases much higher) property taxes due to increasing house prices, which is totally out of their control. I'm not suggesting that they're in a bad spot. It's just not the "jackpot" that your post is suggesting.

mbesto 9y ago
> With all the taxes and fees that you have to pay on the sale price you can't buy the equivalent of your house. So why on earth would someone want to sell their house and buy an equivalent house in the same area...?
- ghaff 9y ago
  In all fairness, I can see wanting to, say, downsize and move to a more walkable community relatively nearby. (Or, for that matter, move out of an expensive urban condo and move somewhere with more room--although that will harder in the Bay area specifically.) To the degree that market value of the two is similar, the financial hit will be substantial. But a lot of this is true with moving generally when you're living somewhere that's OK but isn't really optimal for you any longer.
- nitrogen 9y ago
  Switch schools or districts, change neighbors, move closer to work, change floorplans, move closer to family, etc.
  - sliverstorm 9y ago
    In short, what is important to people in their residence changes. Friend of mine bought a house he and his wife loved. Five years later he came to understand what owning a Dr Horton house means, and they wanted a better-built house.

astura 9y ago

Except you can really only "cash out" in a meaningful way if you sell and relocate to a cheaper area/somewhere without a housing bubble, which is extremely disruptive to your life.

ZeroGravitas 9y ago
There are financial instruments that will allow you to cash out if you own property while continuing to live in it for as long as you want to e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverse_mortgage https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverse_mortgage
- astura 9y ago
  I said "in a meaningful way."

BatFastard 9y ago

I am the only one not seeing "reply" links on some of these posts? I see others of the same depth with reply links... Edit: Actually it's just the one from davidw

astura 9y ago
HN has rate limiting on replies. Reply button should appear after a few minutes.

sliverstorm 9y ago

Suppose they move horizontally to a similar house. I don't know, they want one story instead of two. Since a rising tide lifts all boats, the new purchase is about even with the old sale- but they also owe taxes. So within this window, they are objectively worse off than your average Joe who can move across town without owning those taxes. Anyone trading up is also impacted as well. Suppose you bought a condo at 100k, and SFH was 200k. In five years you want to trade up, but the market went up 100%. Your condo sells for 200k, but the SFH costs 400k. Despite the lovely appreciation on your condo, you'd probably prefer if the market hadn't moved. Sure, there's people who have it worse. Owning any home at all puts them in better shape than most of the world. But it's still not enviable to be unable to move within your community.

losteverything 9y ago

These comments are helpful because this is how people think. When a suit or Talbots customer argues over a price at Wal-Mart you should hear the similar type of tone the cashier takes after they leave. Especially if they argue for a buck or two. This is real world

sctb 9y ago

It doesn't matter what you're responding to; the guidelines ask us not to post like this. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html