The argument that property taxes make Americans renters in their own houses has fueled the biggest anti-tax uprising in half a century, and local governments are scrambling.
Massie dismissed the warnings as alarmist. (“We’re not anarchists,” he said.) Government needs to shrink, he argued, and he assumes the Legislature will find alternatives. A fairer system, he argued, would make people pay for the government services they use, but not those they don’t.
Ugh, I just cannot understand how people think this way. How on earth can you expect government services to be there when you need them if they’re not funded when you don’t need them? It’s almost a corollary to the terrible “don’t tax millionaires because one day I might be a millionaire” argument.
I’m kinda with him in the sense that most municipal taxes go to pay for bloated police departments, fraudulent police overtime, and police brutality settlements.
How? Because they’re all so far up their own asses, they chew their meals twice.
This is the same effect that we saw with localities that repealed their gas tax to provide relief to drivers in the face of rising gas prices due to the US attacks on Iran – the price rose to match the cost including the tax, so government revenues went down, corporate profits went up, and the public gets no relief from high prices
And the relief for homeowners provided by lowering property taxes may counterintuitively make housing less affordable. A 2024 study led by researchers from the federal government and Yale University found that property tax reductions in Georgia led to home price increases. The cuts enticed prospective buyers into bidding wars and encouraged homeowners to hold onto their properties longer, lessening available supply. The rising prices particularly harmed younger, prospective first-time homebuyers while disproportionately benefitting older residents who had owned their homes for long periods, the researchers determined.
Similar generational disparities have long played out in California because of Proposition 13. A Los Angeles resident who has owned a home for 50 years that’s now worth $1 million pays less than $500 annually in property taxes. Yet if their neighbor spent $1 million to buy the house next door last year they would owe $10,000.
A Los Angeles resident who has owned a home for 50 years that’s now worth $1 million pays less than $500 annually in property taxes. Yet if their neighbor spent $1 million to buy the house next door last year they would owe $10,000.
Doesn’t fixing this lead to gentrification, though? Take a bunch of low cost property, raise the value of the properties, increase the taxes, and force poor owners out in lieu of wealthier home buyers?
force poor owners out
This would increase the supply so it would reduce the value of the property and possibly rents because of that.
So it would harm poorer homeowners but may help renters, who tend to be even poorer.
Usually, when we talk about gentrification, it is in terms of changes to the rental price as a result of changes in the local business environment, like firms opening and closing amd changes in wages; however, you are correct that the economics function roughly the same way when the government is raising property taxes to force a couple of empty nesters living off their 401k out of a 5 bedroom household to move to a 1 bedroom apartment as when an apartment complex is raising rents to force a young working family out of their two bedroom apartment to a less desirable neighborhood by raising the rent, especially because both can happen when a new park opens up down the street.
This is such bullshit anti government article wrapped up in millennial “we can’t afford anything” writing.
We need taxes to pay for government services. They go to more things than what we use. The notion that we should only pay taxes for things we use is literally what rich people want so that they don’t have to pay taxes on their mansions.
Of course this is in Ohio… people here have been bitching about our property taxes for years.
You want cheaper cost of homeownership? Encentivize solar installation, abolish HOAs, restrict corporations from buying up homes for “investment”, subsidize new affordable housing, and crack down on Airbnb landlords.
But no, it must be the gubbmint’s fault. You know, the one Republicans have been in control of for decades.
Also Ohio public schools are funded by property tax, and they have zero plans to replace that funding.
They want your children to be penniless, illiterate, peasants.
did people not relize this before. It pays for your local services. what really annoying is towns have started to only allow building of complexes that then collect assesments to take care of streets and a fair amount of sewer and infrastructure but then you also pay tax.
Embarrassingly, it mostly seems to be homeowners who don’t understand escrow disbursements who have recently paid off their houses and are surprised they have to cut a check to cover their property taxes.
Not in my experience. I have known a lot of folks who have only rented who think if they can get a house they are golden. Like first they don’t realize until its paid off they essentially don’t really own it and then second they think once the mortgage is paid off they will have zero housing expenses. Maybe they get they will need to do repairs. Most people who have gone through the process I know seek to get rid of pmi and are well aware of the taxes because you get a statement about your excrow regularly. What I really find with most folks is they don’t understand affordability. Like if their mortgage depends on two incomes and in the future requires more income. Your really taking a gamble. You get people buying more house than they can really afford when there are other affordable options. Often falling for the buy as much house as you can trap. My thing is whatever you buy you should be able to get with a 15 year fixed mortgage and when you buy it get a 30 year fixed.
Buying a house makes you “golden” in the sense that you’re not at the mercy of a landlord who can raise your rent ever year or evict you so a family member can have your place.
If we had renter’s rights in this country buying would make a lot less sense.
If housing prices drop and you are underwater its not so golden and if you pay more than the equivalent rent then you got your price rise in advance. Further if you hold on the mortgage is tenous and interest rates go up then your monthly payment can rise to. Its why I put my guidelines at the end on what is an affordable place to buy. In that scenario your golden but if you buy with a ballon loan on two incomes you may find that its fools gold your relying on.
Housing prices going down only matter if you want to sell.
Sure rents might be cheaper than owning, usually not though. Landloards are greedy as fuck. Buying my home was a good move because rents have gone up a lot since I bought it in my area. And of course rents could go down but… haha I joke.
Regarding mortgages going up after you buy: that’s only going to happen if you have an adjustable. I have a standard fixed mortgage it will never go up.
Certainly my taxes may go up, but that only reflects rising home value and I’d get that out if I sell.
If we had reasonable renter’s protections it would make less sense to buy, but outside of Mamdani’s New York, renter protections are absolutely horrible in this country and buying is the only way to “opt out” of the exploitative landlord system.
yeah so one of my things I had in my comments is criteria for buying a house and not being in trouble. Your sorta gotta take that with the rest of my comments. Its main thing was not being an adjustable. I get the housing going down is only bad if you want to sell. As a matter of fact it cracks me up because I will get neighbors who are so obsessed with housing prices going up but that just raised your tax. I mean I don’t exactly want them going down or stagnating as its an indication things are bad but I also don’t want them skyrocketing. I want them slowly appreciating like an asset like that should so that it basically keeps up with inflation. Its not really suppose to be a big money maker its suppose to be a good money store.
It’s bullshit propaganda from property investors. TL;DR they want a tax break while the rest of us will have to pay more elsewhere.
People and businessess that have bought up or hoarded properties.
They don’t want to pay property tax, it cuts into profits. They’ve squeezed everyone into rentals because we can no longer afford homes. They’ve squeezed the renters for more and more rent. Now the only way to make the line go up is to get a tax break at the expense of municipal services.
And people will still have to pay for things like roads, sewer, libraries, school, snow removal, fire, etc. So the State and municipality will just increase taxes elsewhere.
Either that or we have to pay a subscription to more services. Want the fire dept. to show up if your house is on fire? $50/mo and max 1000 gallons of water, $10/for every additional 100 gallons used. Want them to rescue people upon arrival? $50/mo add-on.
Anyway, the whole point of this hellish corporate dystopia is the wealthy are aiming for yet another tax break while telling the rest of us that we shouldn’t pay property tax because a bunch of us are too stupid to realize that they still have to pay for the services the tax provided.
Maybe this is too conspiratorial, but it doesn’t feel coincidental that right as we’re starting to talk about wealth taxes, we’re seeing a “completely grassroots” campaign to fight against the wealth tax with the broadest reach, property taxes.
The property tax thing has been sporadic for about three years now and seems to have taken up where the “higher education is stupid” trend left off. The anti-wealth tax has been a fight for quite a bit longer.
i sleep: Landlords makes americans renters in houses that they live in. real shit: Property Taxes make americans renters of houses that they own.
I’m going to go out on a limb and say these chuckefucks wouldn’t be happy if there was a compromise that gave them zero property tax, but only on the first 2 properties they own.
