penalty tax the shit out of any owned housing (house or apartment) that stands empty more than 3 months (cumulative) out of a year. Some provision might be put in place for a house or unit under development or repair, which could only be used once every 5 or 10 years per property, regardless of owner. That works against the millions of uninhabited homes that drive up scarcity. It might also peck away at some of that AirBnB-filled places with no places to live (like where I live) in seasonal tourist areas. And it will give property owners incentive to lower prices to make sure they get tenants in (so they don’t incur penalties).
Tax incrementally based on homes/buildings owned, similar to graduated income tax. Own a home with multiple units (and rent out the other units)? You’re good (as long as they are occupied 9mo+ out of the year). Own a second home that you are renting out? Pay a bit more in taxes than your primary home. Own 20 homes? Good look profiting on that.
For #2 in my area people already pay a decent amount more in property taxes if they don’t live in the property. Also companies (and even individuals) usually makes new LLCs for each building they own for liability reasons, so it would have to include a provision for calculating who owns all the LLCs.
Let’s take it step by step:
penalty tax the shit out of any owned housing (house or apartment) that stands empty more than 3 months (cumulative) out of a year. Some provision might be put in place for a house or unit under development or repair, which could only be used once every 5 or 10 years per property, regardless of owner. That works against the millions of uninhabited homes that drive up scarcity. It might also peck away at some of that AirBnB-filled places with no places to live (like where I live) in seasonal tourist areas. And it will give property owners incentive to lower prices to make sure they get tenants in (so they don’t incur penalties).
Tax incrementally based on homes/buildings owned, similar to graduated income tax. Own a home with multiple units (and rent out the other units)? You’re good (as long as they are occupied 9mo+ out of the year). Own a second home that you are renting out? Pay a bit more in taxes than your primary home. Own 20 homes? Good look profiting on that.
For #2 in my area people already pay a decent amount more in property taxes if they don’t live in the property. Also companies (and even individuals) usually makes new LLCs for each building they own for liability reasons, so it would have to include a provision for calculating who owns all the LLCs.
We have a vacancy tax in Vancouver. It works alright but could be better.
https://vancouver.ca/files/cov/vancouver-2021-empty-homes-tax-annual-report.pdf