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> Well the only solution is a ballot initiative to repeal prop 13. That will change things. This seems to always be stated as if stating it makes it true. Prop

> Well the only solution is a ballot initiative to repeal prop 13. That will change things. This seems to always be stated as if stating it makes it true. Prop 13 has little to do with high housing prices and a lot to do with getting more revenue for governments. Prices are influenced by supply and demand. The artificial limiting of supply by all of the governments in California is the biggest factor in why the prices are outrageously high.

fortran77 7y ago
Exactly right. And every time a property is turned over, the base tax rate gets reset, plus prop 13 allows for a 2% increase every year. California has the highest sales and income tax (for incomes over $500,000) in the Nation. They don't need the highest property tax, too.
- lern_too_spel 7y ago
  The reason California has the highest sales and income taxes is that it has the lowest property tax. People who have held property for a very long time are taxed very little relative to how they would be taxed in other states, and people who are new are taxed a lot.
  - fortran77 7y ago
    California does NOT have the lowest property tax. It is very distasteful for you to try to win an argument by lying. http://www.tax-rates.org/taxtables/property-tax-by-state http://www.tax-rates.org/taxtables/property-tax-by-state And if you rank the states by percentage revenue from property tax, you'll see they are right in the middle https://www.urban.org/policy-centers/cross-center-initiatives/state-and-local-finance-initiative/projects/state-and-local-backgrounders/property-taxes https://www.urban.org/policy-centers/cross-center-initiative...
    - AnimalMuppet 7y ago
      It is also very distasteful to accuse others of lying. It's about the least charitable assumption you could make, and therefore against the site guidelines. Not everyone who disagrees with you is lying. Not everyone who disagrees with you and is factually wrong is lying. Some repeat what they've heard. Some just lazily assume without doing the research. Some mis-remember. State that they're mistaken. Cite the evidence. But don't claim that they're lying unless you can prove that they are deliberately stating what is false.
    - generalpass 7y ago
      > California does NOT have the lowest property tax. It is very distasteful for you to try to win an argument by lying. (moderators @dang) > http://www.tax-rates.org/taxtables/property-tax-by-state http://www.tax-rates.org/taxtables/property-tax-by-state > And if you rank the states by percentage revenue from property tax, you'll see they are right in the middle > https://www.urban.org/policy-centers/cross-center-initiative.. https://www.urban.org/policy-centers/cross-center-initiative.... Since the California median home price is more than double the national average for median home prices, your two claims seem clearly to not tell the whole story. What prop 13 does is keep tax rates from increasing beyond a very small percentage of the original purchase price. Thus, property values increase by a lot while taxes collected do not. So the first sentence is sort of true. Anecdotal, but a guy on my street purchased his property with no house on it in the 70s and pays like $100 per year even though it is easily worth over a million, which will heavily skew the stats. The second sentence is completely true: > People who have held property for a very long time are taxed very little relative to how they would be taxed in other states, and people who are new are taxed a lot.
    - dang 7y ago
      > It is very distasteful for you to try to win an argument by lying Whoa. Please edit personal swipes out of your comments here. Your comment would be fine without that bit. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
    - lern_too_spel 7y ago
      It is very misleading of you to post aggregate statistics when people who have owned property a long time pay very different property taxes from people who have not, as I stated in my earlier post.
- amunicio 7y ago
  >> They don't need the highest property tax, too. Prop 13 doesn't change the property tax rate, it changes WHO pays the full "nub" rate and who enjoys a "nobility" rebate. It disincentives home owners from moving, even when their new jobs are far away, increasing commuting time. It also creates a resource allocation imbalance. Folks that are retired and don't benefit so much by living in highly concentrated job areas tend to remain there. Even when younger people who would benefit more from living in these areas would be willing to pay more, providing an incentive for retired owners to move to a less concentrated area and making a profit. But with Prop 13, we have instead a system that artificially distorts the housing market(and not in a "just" or "deserving" way).
  - fortran77 7y ago
    So a retired person should be forced to move from his little 3 bedroom house because some Googler decided the house next door was worth $3.5MM and his property tax goes up to $75,000/year? That's pure evil. I fully supported SB50. Build. More. Housing.
    - amunicio 7y ago
      >> So a retired person should be forced to move from his little 3 bedroom house because some Googler decided the house next door was worth $3.5MM and his property tax goes up to $75,000/year? That's pure evil. Nope. A retired person should have the CHOICE to pocket the $3.5MM the Googler is ready to pay for his house in Palo Alto and buy an even fancier house in Livermore knowing that his property taxes is not going to substantially change much. But with the present system instead, another Googler, let say the food service employee, will never be able to pay the mortgage for a one room apartment PLUS exorbitant "nub" real state taxes. At least the retired guy has a large amount of equity in the house and choices.
    - refurb 7y ago
      Yeah, I feel really sorry for the retired person sitting on millions of dollars of equity. Real sob story. Why not just give the option to defer increases in property taxes? It makes zero sense to give tax breaks to people who won the housing lottery.
- Apocryphon 7y ago
  How about repealing Prop 13, and replacing it with a land value tax? https://www.econlib.org/land-taxes-the-return-of-henry-george/ https://www.econlib.org/land-taxes-the-return-of-henry-georg...
TulliusCicero 7y ago
Prop 13 has a TON to do with high housing prices, because it eliminates the downside of high housing prices: higher property taxes. Once higher property taxes are out of the picture, higher property values are purely beneficial for homeowners, which means there's every incentive to vote for anti-housing policies to enrich themselves at the expense of transplants and immigrants.
- omgwtfbyobbq 7y ago
  I wouldn't say it eliminates it. When you buy a property, you still pay taxes on whatever your purchase price is. Prop 13 just mediates the rate of increase, which is beneficial, but not immediately.
  - technofiend 7y ago
    >When you buy a property, you still pay taxes on whatever your purchase price is. And again every year after that, including whatever increase your taxing authority may legally apply, usually the maximum allowed by law unless you actively fight it. Texas has no state income tax and property taxes are (so they tell me) quite high as a result. My property tax is $7k+ each year. Not onerous because I have a full time job, but many of the retirees and landlords in my area did find it onerous enough to sell. Bad for renters because a lot of reasonably priced rental properly was lost, good for the city because a house like mine was torn down and 5-7 condos or townhomes took their place. Now the city is looking at easily 8 or 9 times the tax revenue for a single lot like mine since these new homes also appraise higher than mine. If anything prop 13 represents one extreme and Texas the other. It would be nice if we could meet somewhere in the middle.
    - ummonk 7y ago
      It isn’t any coincidence that Texas is one of the few places in the US that has experienced large population growth without a corresponding affordability crisis.
      - 7y ago

fortran77 7y ago

Exactly right. And every time a property is turned over, the base tax rate gets reset, plus prop 13 allows for a 2% increase every year. California has the highest sales and income tax (for incomes over $500,000) in the Nation. They don't need the highest property tax, too.

lern_too_spel 7y ago
The reason California has the highest sales and income taxes is that it has the lowest property tax. People who have held property for a very long time are taxed very little relative to how they would be taxed in other states, and people who are new are taxed a lot.
- fortran77 7y ago
  California does NOT have the lowest property tax. It is very distasteful for you to try to win an argument by lying. http://www.tax-rates.org/taxtables/property-tax-by-state http://www.tax-rates.org/taxtables/property-tax-by-state And if you rank the states by percentage revenue from property tax, you'll see they are right in the middle https://www.urban.org/policy-centers/cross-center-initiatives/state-and-local-finance-initiative/projects/state-and-local-backgrounders/property-taxes https://www.urban.org/policy-centers/cross-center-initiative...
  - AnimalMuppet 7y ago
    It is also very distasteful to accuse others of lying. It's about the least charitable assumption you could make, and therefore against the site guidelines. Not everyone who disagrees with you is lying. Not everyone who disagrees with you and is factually wrong is lying. Some repeat what they've heard. Some just lazily assume without doing the research. Some mis-remember. State that they're mistaken. Cite the evidence. But don't claim that they're lying unless you can prove that they are deliberately stating what is false.
  - generalpass 7y ago
    > California does NOT have the lowest property tax. It is very distasteful for you to try to win an argument by lying. (moderators @dang) > http://www.tax-rates.org/taxtables/property-tax-by-state http://www.tax-rates.org/taxtables/property-tax-by-state > And if you rank the states by percentage revenue from property tax, you'll see they are right in the middle > https://www.urban.org/policy-centers/cross-center-initiative.. https://www.urban.org/policy-centers/cross-center-initiative.... Since the California median home price is more than double the national average for median home prices, your two claims seem clearly to not tell the whole story. What prop 13 does is keep tax rates from increasing beyond a very small percentage of the original purchase price. Thus, property values increase by a lot while taxes collected do not. So the first sentence is sort of true. Anecdotal, but a guy on my street purchased his property with no house on it in the 70s and pays like $100 per year even though it is easily worth over a million, which will heavily skew the stats. The second sentence is completely true: > People who have held property for a very long time are taxed very little relative to how they would be taxed in other states, and people who are new are taxed a lot.
  - dang 7y ago
    > It is very distasteful for you to try to win an argument by lying Whoa. Please edit personal swipes out of your comments here. Your comment would be fine without that bit. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
  - lern_too_spel 7y ago
    It is very misleading of you to post aggregate statistics when people who have owned property a long time pay very different property taxes from people who have not, as I stated in my earlier post.
amunicio 7y ago
>> They don't need the highest property tax, too. Prop 13 doesn't change the property tax rate, it changes WHO pays the full "nub" rate and who enjoys a "nobility" rebate. It disincentives home owners from moving, even when their new jobs are far away, increasing commuting time. It also creates a resource allocation imbalance. Folks that are retired and don't benefit so much by living in highly concentrated job areas tend to remain there. Even when younger people who would benefit more from living in these areas would be willing to pay more, providing an incentive for retired owners to move to a less concentrated area and making a profit. But with Prop 13, we have instead a system that artificially distorts the housing market(and not in a "just" or "deserving" way).
- fortran77 7y ago
  So a retired person should be forced to move from his little 3 bedroom house because some Googler decided the house next door was worth $3.5MM and his property tax goes up to $75,000/year? That's pure evil. I fully supported SB50. Build. More. Housing.
  - amunicio 7y ago
    >> So a retired person should be forced to move from his little 3 bedroom house because some Googler decided the house next door was worth $3.5MM and his property tax goes up to $75,000/year? That's pure evil. Nope. A retired person should have the CHOICE to pocket the $3.5MM the Googler is ready to pay for his house in Palo Alto and buy an even fancier house in Livermore knowing that his property taxes is not going to substantially change much. But with the present system instead, another Googler, let say the food service employee, will never be able to pay the mortgage for a one room apartment PLUS exorbitant "nub" real state taxes. At least the retired guy has a large amount of equity in the house and choices.
  - refurb 7y ago
    Yeah, I feel really sorry for the retired person sitting on millions of dollars of equity. Real sob story. Why not just give the option to defer increases in property taxes? It makes zero sense to give tax breaks to people who won the housing lottery.
Apocryphon 7y ago
How about repealing Prop 13, and replacing it with a land value tax? https://www.econlib.org/land-taxes-the-return-of-henry-george/ https://www.econlib.org/land-taxes-the-return-of-henry-georg...

TulliusCicero 7y ago

Prop 13 has a TON to do with high housing prices, because it eliminates the downside of high housing prices: higher property taxes. Once higher property taxes are out of the picture, higher property values are purely beneficial for homeowners, which means there's every incentive to vote for anti-housing policies to enrich themselves at the expense of transplants and immigrants.

omgwtfbyobbq 7y ago
I wouldn't say it eliminates it. When you buy a property, you still pay taxes on whatever your purchase price is. Prop 13 just mediates the rate of increase, which is beneficial, but not immediately.
- technofiend 7y ago
  >When you buy a property, you still pay taxes on whatever your purchase price is. And again every year after that, including whatever increase your taxing authority may legally apply, usually the maximum allowed by law unless you actively fight it. Texas has no state income tax and property taxes are (so they tell me) quite high as a result. My property tax is $7k+ each year. Not onerous because I have a full time job, but many of the retirees and landlords in my area did find it onerous enough to sell. Bad for renters because a lot of reasonably priced rental properly was lost, good for the city because a house like mine was torn down and 5-7 condos or townhomes took their place. Now the city is looking at easily 8 or 9 times the tax revenue for a single lot like mine since these new homes also appraise higher than mine. If anything prop 13 represents one extreme and Texas the other. It would be nice if we could meet somewhere in the middle.
  - ummonk 7y ago
    It isn’t any coincidence that Texas is one of the few places in the US that has experienced large population growth without a corresponding affordability crisis.
    - 7y ago