that’s because buyers are pricing in the taxes, people buy on payment as much as price, I did. I’m gonna pay hefty mello roos (once again not all are mello roos, some are cfd, some infrastructure bond service, some landscape maintenance, some trash service, some voter approved school crap, but it’s the same thing effectively, fixed taxes above the 1%). My tab was 1k a year fixed fees higher than the other development I was considering and $100 a month is about 17k in price differential. If I pay 17k less for the house than in the neighboring development, then it’s a wash in my monthly payment. He could pay 100k more and have pure 1% taxes but it would actually cost him more monthly, so the market finds it’s equilibrium. If his choice is to pay 250k and have 3k in mello roos or 350k and no mello roos, then take the taxes, if prices are equal, go with the lower taxes, point is, don’t get hung up on the taxes, look at the bottom line, what is the “true cost” it’s just math, it’s not subjective.