Property Tax

[Rich Le]

On my street, houses sold for $300,000 and up since construction some years back. How is it possible that some people are paying only about $800 in property taxes per year? I would appreciate it if some expert could elucidate for me. Thanks.

[powayseller]

Proposition 13, passed by voters in 1987, caps the annual property tax increase to 1-3%, or something like that. It’s fair to older people, who can count on a steady property tax increase, and won’t get boosted out of their home because their fixed income can’t cover the rising property taxes.

But it’s unfair to new buyers, and it has caused CA schools to have one of the lowest fundings in the nation. Our schools are a mess because of this.

Warren Buffett has criticized this Prop too. He says he pays less in taxes on his $3 mill home in Laguna Niguel than his $100K house in Omaha, NE. Taxes in Omaha, NE are 3%, and here they are close to 1%.

[PD]

A friend of mine sold his house to guy who was selling his old house and buying a property of the same value so that he could keep his taxes at the rate of his old home. I’m not sure how this worked out but it may explain your neighbors taxes.

[North County Jim]

…and it has caused CA schools to have one of the lowest fundings in the nation. Our schools are a mess because of this.

I think you’ve bought into the spin put out by the education lobby. There’s plenty of money for K-12 in this state IMO.

He says he pays less in taxes on his $3 mill home in Laguna Niguel than his $100K house in Omaha, NE

Does Nebraska have an income tax? California taxes income at a relatively high rate. We also tax sales at a high rate.

I don’t think anyone can make the case that California is a low-tax state.

State government has a spending problem, not a revenue problem.

[Anonymous]

Prop 13 is great for the residential side and not kicking grandma out of her house.

 

There are several egregious loopholes that should be plugged.

 Cash-out refi should be a basis for value re-assessment.  That would seriously crimp the bubble and irresponsible borrowing.

 Secondly, most commercial property is held in an LLC that holds title.  When commercial owners want to sell, they sell the LLC and the deed never changes at the County and taxes never get re-assessed at the sale value.

 This should be plugged and was part of Warren Buffet's proposal when he was still an economic advisor to the Governor.

[powayseller]

Jim, I don’t buy into any of the education lobby. I despise them, and their lies. I go by what I see at my kids’ schools. Poway is supposed to be one of the best school districts in the County, and we have no PE, music, or art lessons, except what is paid by the PTA and private parent fundraising. Our entire computer lab is from money raised at a parent silent auction. The middle school doesn’t have a science lab. The band instruments are in disrepair. And until recently, when Prop U was finally passed, our schools looked like they were in a ghetto. Our school has music taught be a parent after school, art program and materials purchased by PTA. Our kiln, clay, and paints are donated. The PE teacher and computer lab teacher are funded by the PTA. What happens to a school that doesn’t have an active PTA, or that can’t afford these programs?

In San Diego, only parents who can afford to add to the public school budget, will get PE, art, music for their kids.

Oh, and don’t expect your kids to go to the library before or after school, because the librarian is paid only 30 hours per week, so the library is open only during school hours. Since most homework must be researched on the internet and typed, all kids need a computer at home. Don’t count on the computer lab at the middle school, either, because there is 1 computer for every 500 kids.

The middle school was built for 600 kids,not 850, so the 6th graders don’t get lockers and have to carry 20 lb. backpacks around all day. Some parents donated canopies, so they could eat in the shade, since the cafeteria is only large enough for 600 kids.

I could go on and on. Obviously you don’t have any kids in public school, or you wouldn’t have made such an erroneous statement that our school are adequately funded.

Maybe the education money goes to administration. It sure isn’t getting to the classroom. Either we’re seriously underfunded or very wasteful in admin.

[PD]

PS is right. We have an art teacher and music teacher for 1/3 of the school year but only because it is paid for through fundraising. Parents donate a lot of the school supplies.

[sdrealtor]

My child comes home with fundraisers almost everyday. The reason why it is so important to live in a good school district is to have parents capable and willing to support what isnt funded. Its one fo the reasons I wont move for 20 years.

[powayseller]

In Arizona, school funding was always deemed unfair, because property taxes went to that school district, instead of being distributed by the state as in CA.

Still, the inequities persist. As sdrealtor pointed out, only the school districts with parents who can afford supplies and fundraisers, have the materials the kids really need.

Funding is still unfair, because it is INSUFFICIENT. For too long, our voters, most of whom have no kids, thought they don’t want to pay for the education of other people’s kids and voted down new taxes and other education reform. What these people fail to realize is that they need to educate the very people who social security contributions will support them in old age. With 20% of CAs not finishing high school, who will support them in old age? Who will make our economy? It is short sighted to covet money from kids’ education, just because of some resentment of other people’s kids. Even Thornberg scolds this view, and here I agree with him.

[equalizer]

It was 1977 timeframe, NOT 1987.

[PerryChase]

How about taking some money out of defense for education?

Personally, I refuse to vote for any kind of tax increase. And, yes, I’m not happy to pay for other people’s children’s education. Most people are not qualified to have children. If we had a population decrease for once, real estate would not be so expensive and the damage to the environment would be much reduced.

In life, we need licensing (i.e. qualifications) to do almost anything, even cut hair. But there’s no pre-requisite for having children — one of our most important responsiblities we could have. Sex and, voila, out pops a child. Many couples actually think that having a child will “fix” problems in their relationships. Go figure.

I would support legislation requiring the adoption of a child before one could have a natural child…. But don’t think that would be constitutional…..

[lostkitty]

PerryChase-

You said, “Personally, I refuse to vote for any kind of tax increase. And, yes, I’m not happy to pay for other people’s children’s education. Most people are not qualified to have children.”

Educating the entire population of a nation is for the greater good of the society, which, in the end, is for your own good as well. I do not understand your point of view at all.

[lostkitty]

This is why everyone is leaving CA:

Here in NY my kids attend small elementary schools – we have only two classes per grade, K – 6 in our building. At our school, we have a full-time orchestra teacher. She runs a 4th grade orchestra, a 5th/6th grade orchestra, and teaches semi-private string lessons throughout the week — no more than 1-3 kids at a time.

We also have a full-time band instructor. Same format as above. 4th grade band, 5th/6th grade band, and semi-private lessons for all brass/wind/percission throughout the week.

We also have a full-time “Music teacher” who runs three seperate choirs, 4th, 5th, and 6th, the school plays, and also teaches all grades to sing and read music.

We have two art teachers, one full-time, and one who splits her time between our school and another in the district, but is a full-time employee.

We have two PE teachers, same as above, one full-time, one who splits their time.

We have full computer lab, excellent library, etc etc etc… I could go on and on.

My oldest started Jr High this year, and all the small elementary schools get funneled into one campus. I was bracing for the worst having only my experience with schools in Del mar and Coronado for reference. I was pleasantly surprised at what I found this year:

Excellent course selection.
Regular and advanced course offerings in all areas, even in music and art!

Excellent science labs, and seperate science lab and science class times allotted during the week (like college).

My daughter plays in three orchestras since she takes private lessons elsewhere and does not need the private lessons they offer at her school throughout the school day. They have one full-time orchestra teacher (so many kids have dropped out by this level in the strings – but the orchestra is still huge). He runs the 7th grade orchestra, 8th grade orchestra, a “chamber orchestra” for kids who have outside private lessons, and an ‘audition only’ orchestra for 7th/8th combined.

Band instruments are more popular, so there are TWO full-time band instructors. One who does all of the above for 7th grade, except they run an “A” band and a “B” band because so many kids are involved, and another instructor who spends full-time doing the same for the 8th graders. each band teacher stays with his same group for both years that the kids are at the jr high…

This is not a hige jr high either. Only five of these small elementary schools funnel into the jr high… I could go on and on and on about the programs here, but just this insight into how they run the music program alone should give you an glimpse of how they run the academic programs as well…

Yes, this is public school, and yes, our taxes are the highest in the nation (and yes, we are cold in the winter!). However, housing is less expensive, so it is a wash. Actually, it is a wash only financially – we feel that we are ahead otherwise….

[powayseller]

PerryChase, it’s great to have your here, even more so because you are right on!! I’ve got the same saying: people need a license to cut hair, but anyone is allowed to have a child. I used to get so mad when I saw someone bottlefeeding, but I’m getting less judgmental.

I agree that our huge defense budget is stealing money from education. Unfortunately, my fellow Americans love their military. I’m puzzled why we don’t have marches every weekend against the war in Iraq and the military budget. Why do we need to be in almost every country in the world? What other nation has a military that big? What other nation even needs it? Why do we need to have such a big military, if we really are so nice? Shouldn’t everybody LOVE us?

Instead of thinking of paying for other people’s kids’ education, switch to realize you are paying to educate those whose paychecks will be taxed for your Medicare and social security. When they are working, they will pay you back, and the more educated the are, the more they can pay you in entitlements. They will discover the drugs that will heal you, improve cars to run on non-polluting fuels, etc.

My friend with horses said she didn’t think it was fair that the government provides a child tax credit, and not a horse tax credit, because her horses cost as much to feed as a child. I agree. I don’t know why the government subsidizes children. Or houses. Or any of the other things that it decides are useful.

[PD]

Cutting defense invites a raft of other problems. Education needs more money but you don’t rob Peter to pay Paul. Our armed forces are stretched extremely thin. They work unbelievable hours because they are short on both people and equipment. I could go on and on.

There are many problems with our education system. I recently attended a talk with the Principle. She said that one of their main budgeting problems is the requirement that all schools must provide full time assistance to kids with disabilities. What this means is that if a child has a mental or physical disability, the school has to pay for a full time employee to accompany that child through their day as they participate in regular classrooms. This costs the schools huge amounts of money but they DO NOT GET REIMBURSED for the extra expense. They have to take the money out of other programs like music, computers and supplies. It is good program but it should be separately funded as each child who qualifies takes a big chunk out of the school’s budget. My kids school is so desperate for money that they send notes home to parents telling them to send their kids to school if their temp us under 100 degrees because the school loses money with each absence.

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