During the global financial crisis in 2008 – 2009, I expected the San Francisco Property Assessor Office to automatically lower my property tax bill. After all, home prices had topped out at the end of 2006 and had declined about 5% a year for three consecutive years.
Instead of receiving a property tax bill reduction, the city increased my assessed value, thereby increasing my property tax bill! The city did the same for thousands of other homeowners as well, essentially robbing us of our hard-earned money.
As millions of people were losing their jobs and seeing their net worths get crushed, San Francisco didn't seem to care. It wanted its money, regardless of the economic circumstance. The same happened with millions of other homeowners in other cities across the country.
During the financial crisis, I ended up spending hours of my time fighting my property tax bill. I was rejected the first year, but won my case for three subsequent years. It was a maddening process to have to fight against such an obvious wrong.
The government expects its denizens to meekly accept all punishments and like them too. There was no way I wasn't going to stand up against tyranny and a department known for its corruption.
Sadly, you can’t trust the property assesor’s office to do the right thing in a recession. Your city will crave even more property taxes from you during difficult times. As a result, homeowners should be proactive and protect themselves from unfair property tax hikes.
Tax-Paying Citizens Are Often At A Disadvantage
San Francisco not doing the right thing during an economic crisis was my rude awakening to the principle of not relying on the government for anything. It also motivates me to minimize my tax liability as much as possible. The situation also made me question whether working 60 hours a week was worth it given the income tax consequences. Ultimately, I decided no and helped kickstart the FIRE movement in 2009 and ultimately retiring in 2012 partially to pay less taxes.
You can rationally argue your case with any reasonable person or institution. But when it comes to arguing against the omnipotent government about why your property taxes should be lower, you are always at a disadvantage. A larger government with a big budget also creates tremendous inefficiencies.
The best example of the government's “heads I win, tails you lose” power can be found in our system for filing taxes.
Government's Heads I Win, Tails You Lose Policy
Government: You owe us money. It’s called taxes.
Me: How much do I owe?
Gov’t: You have to figure that out.
Me: I just pay what I want?
Gov’t: Oh, no we know exactly how much you owe. But you have to guess that number too.
Me: What if I get it wrong?
Gov’t: You go to prison
OK, you don't usually go to prison for filing your taxes incorrectly. You simply pay a penalty plus interest. But you get the point.
Ironically, if you are an average income tax-paying citizen, you are often more vulnerable to paying taxes than the very rich who have the resources to legally avoid paying taxes.
You're also at a disadvantage when compared against the ~50% of Americans who pay no income taxes at all. After all, if you have been steadily paying your taxes, this is a clear signal to the government to keep squeezing you like a humungous zit.
Reduce Your Property Tax Bill By Downgrading Your Property Statistics On Redfin And Zillow
If you feel your property assessor office won’t automatically do the right thing and is corrupt, consider downgrading your property statistics on Redfin, Zillow, and other online property estimate sites. Your goal should be to make your home look as crappy as possible.
Over the decades,I have battled many property assessors. Every single one of them have looked up my property online to see its number of bedrooms, bathrooms, landscaping, and upgrades. The property assessor also used Google Maps to get a top-down satellite view of my property.
Given you can't rely on the property assessor to lower your property tax bill automatically during a downturn, your mission is to proactively protect yourself by downgrading your property statistics as follows:
- Decrease the number of bedrooms you have to a still believable number. For example, if you have a five-bedroom house, decrease it to two bedrooms. Decreasing your bedroom count to one bedroom will look like an error.
- Decrease your number of bathrooms to no more than one bathroom for every two or three bedrooms. You can turn a full bathroom into a half or quarter bathroom as well.
- Decrease the livable square footage and the lot size. Cutting your livable square footage by half is a realistic amount.
- Block your home's street view from Google Maps and Apple Maps. Here's an article on how to do so. By doing so, someone from the property assessor's office will have to drive out to your home to check it out. And they usually will not.
- Remove all pictures or add old rundown pictures of your home online. This tactic is excellent for Stealth Wealth and may reduce the temptation for robbers to break into your home. Now that's a very valuable benefit!
Don't Let Your Ego Make Your Home Beautiful Online
When I was young and naive, after every home purchase or gut remodel, I would go online and update my home's statistics. If I added a new bedroom, bathroom, living room, and laundry room, I would stupidly upload pictures of the remodel. Then I would add the additional livable square feet.
Why? Because I was proud of my work and wanted to show off! But being proud and showing off only results in more reasons for the property assessor's office to raise my property taxes! When it comes time for them to raise your property taxes after remodeling with a permit, you can really screw yourself.
Hence, after every remodel, I now downgrade my property statistics and pictures to make it look old. In fact, I successfully lowered the value of one rental property by about $1 million to better protect it against property tax increases!
When it comes to saving money on property taxes, crush your ego. I know you might want your friends and family members to see what a nice house you live in. But making your house Instagramable may just invite envy along with a higher property tax bill.
Instead, here's a more appropriate picture of what the interior of your home should look like if you insist on posting pictures online. Just like how police officers ticket expensive sports cars more, it’s best to drive a beater if you don’t want unwanted attention.
No Guarantees Of A Lower Property Tax Bill
Obviously, the people who work at the property assessor's office aren't stupid. They have historical records of your property to compare with in case the online statistics look off. Further, if there was ever a permit filed for a remodel, updated information about square footage and the number of rooms will likely be recorded.
That said, you don't want to arm the property assessor with more ammunition to hike your property taxes in a recession by making your home look amazing online. Each time I appealed my property taxes, I was required to submit comparable properties and details about their size, condition, and more.
Know the property assessor does not have the right to enter your property and inspect it. Further, you also have every right to protect your privacy by scrubbing your online data. Zillow, Redfin, and other websites aren't the authority on deciding what your property's value is.
Related post: Even Zillow Can’t Trust Its Own Estimates
Property Condition Is Subjective
During the pandemic, I appealed one of my rental property tax bills and lost. Even though I had purchased the property price for X, the assessor assessed my property's value at X plus $100,000!
Their reasoning was that I had purchased the price below market value. But by definition, market value is whatever someone is willing to pay at the time! What a racket.
Check out this pictures I submitted to demonstrate the old condition of the property when I purchased it. Although the bathroom is from the 1940s, the assessor kept arguing the bathroom looked new and great! Come on now. On top of the right side faucet there's even a note saying “Do not use, broken.”
The Haunted House Look
If you want to take lowering your property taxes a step further, you may also want to make the front of your house look like a horror show.
One homeowner in my neighborhood has left the front of his home looking like a haunted house since 2008. The house's paint is all cracked and chipped. Two windows are cracked and covered with what looks like blankets. Even the gutters are all rusted and broken.
But one day, its neighbor hosted an open house. From the neighbor's house, I could see the back of the haunted house had been fully remodeled with nice landscaping. But all the remodeling was invisible from the street. Such a brilliant way to scare off robbers and keep its property tax bill down!
Know that even if home prices decline over the next three years, the property assessor office likely won't do the right thing and automatically lower your property tax bill. Instead, the assessor office will keep raising property tax bills and count on the vast majority of homeowners to not protest.
Downgrade Your Property Statistics Online On Zillow And Redfin
For those willing to fight, the city will make the appeal process cumbersome. You will also most certainly have to pay a fee to appeal. The city does this on purpose to discourage homeowners from trying.
In an economic downturn, tax receipts go down. Hence, city politicians are incentivized to raise your taxes to make up for a revenue shortfall. More money keeps the party going for politicians with protected incomes. Please beware of this sad fact.
Just like how showing off on social media isn't a wise move, showing off your home online isn't either. Suppress your ego. Make your property look as bad as possible if you want to save money on property taxes.
If you are raising young children at home, having a crappy looking property may also protect you from robbers. If you are a thief, you Will want to target expensive looking homes with hopefully expensive things inside. For example, one $50 million home I know has over $200 million of artwork on the walls!
And when you've finally had enough of dealing with an unfair property assessor, then you can easily move onto investing in real estate 100% passively.
Paying $100,000 a year in property taxes is my limit. Today, I gladly invest in private real estate funds so I don't have to deal with any shenanigans any longer.
Reader Questions And Recommendations
Readers, have you downgraded your property statistics online to make your home look cheaper than it really is? Why do you think the government refuses to do the right thing and automatically lower a homeowner's property tax bill when prices decline? Do you feel you have a right to protect your privacy online?
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Hi Sam, thank you for the great content over the years! Came upon this company–able to help review tax on properties each year and advocate for lower tax burdens. I haven’t tried them, but their fee is advertised as “pay only if actual property tax is lowered.” For those living in States where they operate, may be worth a second look. Ownwell dot com
It’s despicable how cities continue to Jack up property taxes, despite property values falling.
Austin is now going in reverse in price by double digits, but our property taxes are still going up. I wish cities would automatically adjust down, not always up.
Government corruption and wasteful spending is horrendous.
The only people against making your house look cheaper than it is are either ego maniacs or renters who don’t pay property taxes.
One of the keys to greater empathy regarding paying taxes, is for everybody to pay property, taxes, and income taxes, not just a portion of the population.
I totally get how easy it is to tell people to pay more taxes when you don’t have to pay more yourself or don’t pay any yourself. But I think intuitively, people know this is hypocritical. We all need to be contributing to this great country.
Los angeles County raised my property more than double after assuming a loan of 200k from my sister house. They house had been in the family since 1980. It was a rental for over 20 years and was in terrible run down shape, the LA County didn’t care and I got hit with a supplemental tax bill followed by paying over 6500 dollars since 2016. The house across the street is identical and they pay 4000 dollars a year. Built in 1926 and identical lot size and shape, go figure???
I have been a follower for a few years. I appreciate your candor and sharing your own experiences and your willingness to question the status quo, say around safe withdrawal rates from retirement savings. I think its important to split this suggestion into two pieces. If you want to downgrade your home on zillow for the purpose of your privacy, then thats fine. However, mapping that to your taxes due is fraud, and I think its horrible that you promote such behavior and normalize it. We live in an country that has provided amazing opportunities for people, espeically many of the people reading your website. (I think you have argued as such.) The only way all that is possible is if people actually pay their taxes and do so in a fair and honest manner. The biggest three uses of tax dollars at the federal level are social security, medicare, and military spending. Those three are 70% of the budget. After that its education, veterans, benefits, etc. What of that don’t you like? At the state level, the biggest use of funds is education, 1/3rd goes to K-12 education, most of that in salaries for teachers. Its all too easy to focus on the few percent we don’t like and abdicate all responsibility. I would love to pay less in taxes. I would love for the government to be more efficient. Not contributing to society is not the way to get to those results. I would argue that myself, you, and your readers, have likely been big beneficiaries of the US. The government has created the rules and laws that allow the US to be the financial center of the world, which allowed you (and me) to get jobs in finance, make large amounts of money, and retire early. To not contribute honestly I think is selfish and weakens the fabric of society. It is true that the uber wealthy benefit from the tax code and often pay very little in taxes, but other people gaming the system does not make your suggestion of lying to lower your taxes right.
Also, I will add, I personally owned a home, purchased at the peak in 2007, and it was a lot of work to get the county assessor to lower the value. However, they eventually did lower the value after a year. It was infuriating deal with them. In the end, I think that the opportunities I have had wouldn’t have been possible in any other country, and therefore while the system is frustrating, its also worked really well for me. I try and remember that when forking over all those tax payments, and I think we would all be better off to stop viewing taxes as something to avoid and instead see it as contributing to a broad, collective effort that is very much a work in progress, but its also better than almost anywhere else I know.
True. We live in an amazing country. But if the city property assessor’s government is trying to raise your property taxes when your property’s value is going down in a recession, what is that to you? Will you let them bully you into paying more, even though you should pay less?
At some people, people have to stand up for themselves to better provide for their families. Some people think the majority of working Americans don’t pay income taxes is fine. Others think raising taxes on others without being willing to pay more taxes yourself is fine. When will it stop?
I pay about $100,000 a year in property taxes. That is a strong contribution to my local economy. To ask for more during the Global Financial Crisis was not right.
Well it depends when you bought the properties. What if you purchased them in 1991 and the valuations were still miles below fair market value in 2007? Why shouldn’t the valuations go up by the maximum allowed under law? And then if that value is too high, you obviously should appeal them, which you did. There is a process, and following that process is the right think to do. To suggest otherwise is to quickly devolve into a world where no one trusts the system. It quickly leads to things like we have now where people refuse to accept election results because its not what they think is “right”. It doesn’t end well when everyone decides what is “right” because everyone things they are doing more than enough and they are right. Play by the rules. I pay a lot in taxes, but I also have made a lot of money. Every year I complain to my wife about how much we pay, and she always reminds me that the 50% of people who don’t pay would love to pay this much in taxes. And honestly, she is right. Its hard to know others situations, but its not a good idea to encourage people to lie or cheat because they don’t like how the system works. Thats how the system breaks down. And the system works pretty well, at least for those of us paying 6 or 7 or more figures in taxes.
Sounds good to me. I just encourage people to fight for their finances and their right to protect their livelihoods when the government doesn’t do the wrong thing.
I also know the government relies on its citizens to just accept things and never fight back when they see something wrong. And if you or others are fine with that, that’s all good. I won’t judge you or others for doing what you want.
Society needs people to keep working and keep paying taxes. It helps others stay free and retired. And if you believe Zillow and Redfin etc are the authority on the value of your house, so be it.
Taking actions to mitigate taxes is… a very big part of tax planning
I really enjoy reading your blog. However, on several points you’re suggesting property owners do is frankly fraudulent. You cannot simply arbitrarily decrease the number of bedrooms, bathrooms, or especially living area. Updating Zillow or other online resources with incorrect data won’t do much to impact assessor’s valuation methodology. Assessors don’t get their data from Zillow, but rather it’s the opposite. Zillow and others are likely pulling data from assessors database. Assessors in turn, receive data from building and planning departments, and subsequently update with permits pulled on the property for remodel, expansion, or demolition. Generally they don’t go out to sites such as Zillow for their fact finding mission. If property owners complete major renovations, additions, etc without pulling permits, which does happen often, they’re risking code violations. Violations are often discovered when properties are either physically inspected by assessors or building inspectors, or during transactions, both of which may result in undesired liability. Furthermore, a property may be not insurable, or if insurance company finds out that major work’s been done without permits, which if results in insurable event, the insurance policy may be void.
The best means to reducing property valuation is to illustrate errors that assessor may have made, qualitative or quantitative, and/or provide supporting evidence based on valuation methodology why assessor’s opinion of value is not indicative of property’s true market value.
Got it. What is the penalty for downgrading your homes online statistics if it is fraudulent? It would be good to know the jail time and financial penalties so we can make a more informed decision.
Given I have spoken and traded emails with many Property Assesor’s, I would love to know your direct experience battling the property assessor’s office and what they’ve told you. Have you been successful in lowering your property taxes with quantitative and qualitative arguments?
Or, maybe you are from the assessor’s office. Some background would be great. Thanks!
I am so glad you wrote this as it confirms my own strategy! I’m currently renovating the interior of our fixer upper I bought in 2020 and keeping the exterior looking as terrible as possible for as long as my wife can stand it lol. I haven’t taken it so far as to change bedroom and bathroom quantities on public records… that’s next-level thinking and why I keep reading your stuff. But I wish you would have posted this a month ago… I actually got the assessor to lower my assessed value about 5% this year by calling and complaining about their huge increases based on some ridiculous comps near me. While I think my house should be assessed lower based on the exterior condition, I’m satisfied for now with the current re-assessment. Next year I will be more prepared and have more ammunition I think to argue and possibly file a formal complaint.
Does the city of San Francisco get their assessor information from Zillow?
I just moved here a few months ago and Sam has been here 20 years so he certainly knows more about the city than I do.
Maybe this is all tongue and cheek?????
The assessors will check Zillow, Redfin, etc as a cross reference to historical records. It’s easy and free for them.
The government also raised my property tax bill every year doing the global financial crisis. I tried to fight it, but I couldn’t. They just kept on using some random expensive comparable home to justify them hiking my property taxes.
It was crazy that they wouldn’t accept the real comparables within a two block radius.
Thanks for at least giving homeowner some hope and some action steps to take to prevent getting railroaded by the property assessor!
Was this an older article republished? I’m pretty sure I’ve read this before and tried to take your advice on the Redfin and Zillow apps. I decided to check again and Redfin will let me update home facts but not Zillow. When I try to change home facts on Zillow I get the following message: “To bring you the most up-to-date housing information, we’ve recently changed how we receive listing data. As a result, for some off-market homes, including yours, editing home facts is not currently available. We apologize for any inconvenience and appreciate your patience while we work on improving this experience.” Anyone else have this message?
This is a new post with a more detailed message. I actually did encounter what you encountered for one of my properties on Zillow. But I kept trying and I was finally able to downgrade the statistics.
Related post: https://www.financialsamurai.com/even-zillow-cant-trust-its-zestimates-how-to-profit/
I was able to contact Zillows help desk and they got it all fixed for me. It may take them a little while before you hear back though. I believe it was about a week and a half before I got a response back.
I am curious, and frankly surprised, about your recommendation to not tell the truth, or stated more bluntly, to lie about one’s house to lower property taxes, e.g. reduce the number of actual bedrooms to a false and lower, yet believable, number. Perhaps I am misunderstanding, but it sounds like a recommendation to cheat on your taxes. Thoughts?
The recommendation is to protect yourself from government corruption as the assessor may raise your property tax bill in a recession. You also want to protect yourself from unwanted guests.
If the government was honest, it would lower the homeowners’ property taxes automatically when prices declined. But the government is not incentivized to do that as tax receipts decline. It is incentivized to do the opposite.
The government is counting on people to be comfortably numb and pay what they tell people to pay, despite the numbers being wrong.
What do you do when the government overcharges you? Do you take it or do you stand up and fight? The government is counting on most citizens to do nothing and pay the overcharge.
Two wrongs don’t make a right. :) Just my 2 cents…
No worries :) Protecting your privacy, protecting your family, and fighting against a property assessor office that doesn’t do the right thing during a recession is not a wrong in my opinion.
But that’s the beauty of things. We all have a right to our opinions and can do what we want.
If you don’t mind, I would like to use your name and comment for a future post. I want to explore how Zillow and redfin was able to dominate the public’s belief that it is the authority on property values. I also want to explore our different beliefs about online privacy.
If you can share your background, your property tax situation, and anything else about yourself for the post that would be great.
Thanks!
I agree, there is a big difference between hiding (“protecting”) your information and outright lying (“reduce the number of bedrooms”). If your financial advice is to lie for gain, where do you draw the line? Tax fraud? Gets messy quickly.
Not sure. It’s really up to you if you think protecting your privacy is tax fraud or not. If you were to persecute someone for tax fraud for downgrading their home’s statistics, I don’t think you’ll win.
A lot of people want their privacy. And before Zillow, Redfin, etc.. there was no readily public information online about your house.
Instead of thinking of it as a financial gain, think about downgrading your property’s statistics as PROTECTION against a government that tries to hike your property taxes in a bear market, when they should be cutting them if property prices are going down.
Did you own a home during the Global Financial Crisis? If so, what was your property tax experience? Because if you’ve never experienced this type of government maneuvering, it’s hard to understand. It’s kind of like some people for raising taxes without having to pay more taxes themselves.
LOL. You clearly don’t pay taxes and did not own property during the GFC.
But one of the reasons why it’s easy to get ahead is bc companies can manipulate you into doing anything they want. The government rely on an obedient middle class to serve them.
So keep on being a good boy so the rest of us can relax.
If by “obedient” mean “obey the laws of the land” … then I’m guilty. If you’re an advocate of deceit for financial gain then by all means – you do you – just know that most people here are honest workers looking for honest ways to improve.
And I’ve paid taxes since 1998, almost $800K last year, and own property. Your ability to “clearly” guess my status is … well … not very clear.
the county should have a GIS portal which has all ur information from original building permits, Reno permits to include a picture your house they would have taken and a sketch of outer perimeter of house with measurements, number of bathrooms, above grade finished sq footage, basement sq footage. It may be different in san francisco if your house is 70 years old and it may be incorrect but most houses built since 1980 have accurate information on the county website so doubtful the Zillow downgrade will do anything.
The older your house, the more discrepancies there may be in the city records. I have seen this time and time again over the past 20 years here in San Francisco.
I have personally talk to the three different Property Assesor’s who use online data to justify their property assessment valuations.
Are you saying it is illegal to protect your online privacy? I’m uncomfortable if everybody knows where I live, how much I spend, and all that.
You have been brainwashed into thinking Zillow and Redfin estimates are now the law and standard. What are you say to the millions of homeowners out there who have not updated their home statistics online because they simply don’t use Zillow and Redfin and don’t care? Are they tax cheats?
What is your home address? Let’s have a look at the details.
Completely agree! It’s ridiculous that what appears on Zillow and Redfin is supposed to be “the new law” that dictates everything and determines the real value of your property.
There is SO much BS and inaccurate price and info on those websites and the government is being lazy and biased by using them. There were a lot fewer egregious property tax bills before those sites existed.
And to also add to my comment below, he’s not saying to cheat on your taxes. The system is messed up. The government shouldn’t be lazy and use sites like that which have no state or federal standards or government control or reliable oversight. Those sites can make sh!t up left and right if they want.
Fair market value should be based on actual nearby comparable sales and actual local economic data. The government shouldn’t get to charge a homeowner more just because they see a “pretty” or “fancy” picture of the property’s landscaping or interior design online – that sh!t is too subjective anyway.
In Minnesota we don’t use publicly available sites (they scrape their info off our GIS and MLS anyway)
I agree, if this is how it works wherever you are?
I did this when you made a suggestion in one of your articles from months ago. You provided some additional good tips! I should change the number of rooms / sq footage on Redfin and Zillow for my properties to more reasonable numbers.
ahhh- but you could be shooting yourself in the foot if you happen to be a seller of your property in the (near) future. It is becoming harder and harder to change the stats on your home through the data aggregators especially if they conflict with gov/public records. Having mixed messages out there about your property, come sell time, might bring disadvantageous buyer scrutiny to your property and affect valuation discussions… “geez, this property is listed for $3 million, but the zestimate says $2 million, something must be wrong, off, weird, etc with it and I am suspicious from the beginning….” or “are you sure your property is not 1,000sqft less (and thus $300k less) vs what I am seeing online..?”
Though the euphoric times might be abating, i think we need to give some weight to buyers and their “due diligence” for better or for worse, on the redfins and zillows of the world and how it sadly disportionately affects their decisions….
If you plan to sell the property, you simply upgrade the statistics back. You or your realtor might even stage the property and upload staged pictures.
It usually takes less than three days for the online algorithms to update the property’s value. And it always takes more than three days to prepare your house for listing.
The MLS data is what is looked at first and then prospective homebuyers will come and see the property for themselves. Finally, there is property inspection.
The Property Assesor office will do none of that. There are too many homes and they rely on the Internet and records.
I know I’m gonna be unpopular here, BUT we (*sigh*, yes we) look at a house as it’s built, base it off blues and measure, and if there are changes we get permits. We also walk thru neighborhoods twice a decade, and pick up small things (and some big things…..the amount of basement finishes and decks that have been removed where they don’t tell us is insane……it’s a ghost value that shouldn’t exist, but these folks seem to think property taxes are just there to unjustly penalize you, so they don’t call after water damage). Every year we cary forward the previous years physical qualities and depreciate everything for one more year of wear and tear, then look at comparables. If someone calls to go.over physical characteristics, we request a review where we’d go.over it via walk thru OR if a sale is recent we’d look at MLS (yes, we have access, which kinda makes the point moot. Again, maybe Cali has different rules, but a lot of this comes across as rumors or hearsay being presented as fact)
I get it, it’s frustrating when values went down 30% and taxes remained roughly the same in the late aughts…..but also I don’t want 30% fewer roads, schools, or police. So I’m glad it’s fixed. It also insulated everyone from paying 20+% more during this last jump……unless folks voted on huge levies, in which case it would have jumped (taxes, not value) regardless.
You are trying to save folks money and following your own moral compass, but I fear you may be operating on a mix of incorrect assumptions and assigning negative intent to folks just trying to adhere to the laws each state votes on to make sure libraries remain open, then go home to their modest house and their kiddos. If you ever think you’d have a bad value, always call. Good luck,.my dudes
Were are you around during the 2008 global financial crisis? Millions of people lost jobs and experienced economic devastation while local city governments refused to lower their property tax bills.
I suspect you are either too young or too wealthy are you simply have a low property tax bill to empathize with the middle class who suffered greatly during the last financial crisis.
We had programs in place for those who lost their shirts, actually. But Minnesota has always had more safety nets and looking out for their citizens than most states (for which I’m grateful). BUT how would you propose roads, watersheds, schools, libraries, and police get paid, if not for those property taxes? Would you want to lose 30% of cops when the economy goes bad and crime goes up? Doesn’t make sense to me. This isn’t some evil bloodsucking monolith, it’s society figuring out how to pay for the scaffolding of society so we all don’t devolve I to an anarchic state. Which again, I’m a fan of avoiding. If you have a better way, talk to.your rep. If your issue is with the concept of social contracts, than I fear you picked the wrong country to live in, and the wrong time :-/
It’s interesting you make assumptions about my age or wealth because I care about maintaining watershed districts all while posting about how value increase market wide doesn’t inherently increase taxes being collected (ya know, yay!) But instead flip to the inverse, wanting your cake and eating it too. “Taxes shouldn’t go up when markets rise
But also they should go down when it falls”. Bit of a logical inconsistency there, my man. Guess is you haven’t explored that thought process beyond feeling aggrieved?
Here in Australia property taxes are based on “unimproved value” i.e. the value of an empty lot of that size in that location. So, none of these tricks would work here :(
I hear what you’re saying. I find it incredibly annoying that there are so many websites now that publish property records. I think tech companies have taken public record too far. I’ve had issues with my property taxes going up irrationally and it’s such a battle dealing with red tape and bureaucracy.
Maybe it’s different in y’all’s states, but mine is always budget dependent. If levies don’t change, the same teachers/roads/cops/libraries/watersheds need to be paid for, so if there’s a downturn (like 08) or a 20+% uptick (like last year, taxes don’t go up or down, since teachers shouldn’t get 20% more due to a boom market, or 30% paycut due to a drop. And if you’re in a nicer area (built in districts like boutique shopping, parks, lakes etc) your insulation from a crash means while you may drop 20%, others are dropping 30, so your piece.of the overall market share pie increases. Increasing values of properties doesn’t get the assessor more.money, nor does it magically collect.more for the overall government……that would be rife with corruption, then
There’s plenty of corruption in SF. With a $12+ billion annual budget, some government workers can’t help themselves. See below about our current mayor’s ex-boyfriend.
https://abc7news.com/amp/mohammed-nuru-sentencing-sf-government-bribery-scandal-corruption-charges-guilty/12162936/
https://sfstandard.com/politics/city-hall/tone-at-the-top-led-to-fraud-bribes-at-department-of-building-inspection-report-finds/
What city are you in?
I’m based out of Minnesota, and doesn’t matter where In the state you are, fall levies set budgets, and then it’s taking previous years market value to figure out who pays what to get next year’s voted upon budget. I think (?) That’s pretty close to how other states operate, but will confess to a lack of expertise there
Oh yes, I do see those companies that publish the names of who bought white and when. Is there anyway wonder why are some rich people set up LLCs to mask their purchases? Everybody should find ways to protect their privacy online.