Ha, ha, NSR! I think ALL heirs from EVERY area of CA (not just the LJ’s of CA) should pay property tax based upon the stepped-up value of their parents/grandparents home on the date of their death (or date of transfer, whichever occurs first). Presently, they’re having their cake and eating it, too. I don’t care if they’ve been living out of their car for the last three years. If they can’t afford $3000+ per year for property tax to live in an otherwise “free” home, then they can’t afford to live there and should elect to sell it. This doesn’t even include the costs of fire insurance (which they undoubtedly don’t all have), extermination, utilities, landscaper, pool person (if applicable) and handyman if they can’t do the maintenance themselves.
And I agree with spd. I’ve been “shopping” on the ground … very informally since Fall 2012 in four states … all “flyover states.” Even though I have 2 longtime RE broker relatives I could get instant help from, I never utilized either of them and never actually viewed a property … didn’t need to. I understand types of houses well enough from online photos and wasn’t yet a serious buyer. I just drove though areas and drove by a few properties to “get a feel” for the area. These exercises helped me to decide to remain in Cali. People, there are no “bargains” out there. For what I want (fairly simple one-story home on larger lot), it isn’t any cheaper in those states when you take into account A/C running constantly several months per year, extermination in and out (nearly year-round in some areas), attempting to mitigate excessive humidity or excessive dryness in the home (both of which I’m sensitive to), the presence of blooming trees and plants everywhere for half the year which I’m highly allergic to, the cost and hassle of winterizing vehicles and homes, rusty water you can’t drink and don’t really want to bathe in, polluted lakes and streams, frequent hail, high winds (incl tornadoes) and scorching heat, etc, Cali seems like a bargain when all is said and done … even with the threat of earthquake! Housing in the state of Colorado (which is breathtakingly beautiful in some areas) is pricey in all the areas I was even remotely interested in living in (on par with SD prices except the coast). On the front range, it has been a hot seller’s market for at least 18 months (and for up to 3 years in some of my choice areas). Bidding wars are the norm, just for the typical mid-century brick ranch (with or without a basement) which are everywhere. My mom’s old home just a few miles from downtown Denver, which we sold almost 20 years ago (after her death) is now worth four times as much as we sold it for and the couple we sold it to is still there, now with four teenage kids. (They all posed for a pic for me this summer in the front yard next to now HUGE trees :-)) Good one-story mountain homes start at about $450K (in lesser-known small towns) and don’t always have access to natural gas, sewer or high-speed internet. The “radiant” (floor) heat used in many mountain homes is very expensive to run and a leachfield is expensive to maintain in often rugged terrain.
In flyover states, gas for your vehicle is really the only thing that is cheaper than Cali.
South Lake Tahoe is looking better and better to me and is still relatively “affordable.”
