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> Keeping property taxes means that old people have to pay yearly rent to the government to simply keep their house. In Florida that's about 2k a year for my ho
by usaar333 8y ago
> Keeping property taxes means that old people have to pay yearly rent to the government to simply keep their house. In Florida that's about 2k a year for my home.
I don't see why, at least in an area with any sort of constrained land supply, it is desired to keep old people in the same home (I can see same community, not same home).
From a land efficiency standpoint, where single family homes and apartments/condos both exist, you'd generally want to incentivize:
* childless folks (young people, empty nesters) in smaller homes (apartments, condos)
* families with children in larger homes (single family homes)
Property taxes are a powerful incentive to encourage people that become empty nesters to move to smaller locations. The lack of incentive to do this is part of why Bay Area single family home prices are surging - older demographics aren't selling their homes to families that really want to own for stability reasons.
(note: For the curious, in CA, Prop 13 doesn't per se create a disincentive as it allows moving the tax base to a new property for those older than 55 - but its presence removes what would be a strong incentive (cut taxes by moving). A strong tax disincentive to move though is capital gains tax structure on housing).
- clarkmoody 8y agoMaybe you should let people decide for themselves where they want to live?
- virmundi 8y agoNo, we cannot allow that. We have to allow the state to have absolute power to make poor decisions and then force everyone to conform to those poor decisions. Look at SF. The right answer is to for old people that bought into the town during the Haight-Ashbury days to sell since they are too cash poor for the rents (property tax). The wrong decision is to change the zoning laws that prevent 5+ story apartment buildings that meet earthquake code.
- usaar333 8y agoThose are related things. A locality is more willing to solve a housing shortage if existing residents are also being punished for said shortage in the form of higher property taxes.
- usaar333 8y agoCan you expand? All taxes are distortionary.. the tax system always creates some incentive that wouldn't be there without the tax. Might as well make it a good one.
- toasterlovin 8y agoI’m all for that, as long as everybody is paying a fair amount of property taxes. In California, you can have two identical houses next to each other and the person who bought 40 years ago may be contributing to funding local government at < 1/10th the level of the person next door who bought last year.