Hacker News Reader

Comment by chrisco255 | Hacker News Reader

Ah, the logic of progressivism. These "vacant" homes are already taxed at whatever millage rate is set in Los Angeles...I'm presuming it's more than zero. Furthermore, investment homes do not get tax exemptions, so they're already taxed at higher rates than primary homes. Finally, this is unenforceable without weekly spying to determine if a home is occupied or not. In other words it will cost more to enforce, is potentially a violation of the 4th amendment, and will do nothing to fix homelessness.

California needs to revamp zoning laws and fix the mess that those laws created.

View on HN

In Melbourne, Australia, we have a 'vacant landlord' tax and part of what initiated this law was a survey was done of the water consumption of properties in Melbourne - ie little or no water consumption = no one living there.

On that measure, they calculated something like 16% of investment properties were vacant.

https://www.afr.com/real-estate/residential/vic/investors-ke...

In the ACT we have Land Tax. Doesn't matter if there are tenants or not.

"""Land tax applies to residential properties that are not used as principal places of residence, including all residential properties owned by a trust or corporation. Land tax does not apply to commercial properties."""

Given human nature, the ways laws and regulations are made, and the actual price of tap water in a developed country, I don't see this evolving into anything other than landlord figuring a way for their non rented places to consume enough water to pass the test. I'm happy for you guys if it's working, and maybe I'm too jaded, but I know this wouldn't work here in France, only make things worse.

They also check whether the bond has been lodged at the govt authority (this is mandatory)

One of the widely available $20 garden watering timers that flushes water down the toilet.

I bet Melbourne already has entrepreneurs selling the installation of this "water surveillance solution" at value pricing: a fraction of the saved occupancy tax!

When designing the law, you just need to consider this possibility as a fraud, and then if you do this you are facing a huge fine or a prison sentence. That's how all taxes work.

Of course some people would still infringe law (#Balkany) but most would not.

I the special case of France: such a law would be really easy to apply, at or least it would without Macron's changes: as everybody living somewhere was paying the «taxe d'habitation», every house without anyone paying for inhabiting it is an empty house. And in practice, with the suppression of the «taxe d'habitation», cities could just raise the level for the «taxe foncière» and it would have the same effect as a taxe on empty houses, without any special work to do.

The question is, what kind of fuckery is going on to make vacant property more profitable than rented property in the first place?

For multi-unit properties in some California cities: rent control.

A large number of laws written by people that don't understand economics.

For people who need money in something besides a bank, but don’t want the hassle of being a landlord. So not really profit, but something they feel will appreciate in value.

>These "vacant" homes are already taxed at whatever millage rate is set in Los Angeles...I'm presuming it's more than zero.

Prop 13 essentially broke the concept of property tax in California.

That is an absurd statement. For example, it resets every time the house is sold.

right. but its still limited to 1% of purchase price and only 2% raise each year. Whereas the other 49 states, reassess and raise taxes.

Prop 13 incentivizes not moving, and it only gets better the longer you dont move

I do think Prop 13 should only apply to a primary residence. FL has a homestead exemption, for example, that lowers the assessment and there's a cap on yearly increases.

Prop 13 is the only reason my grandma can live in the home that she purchased. Otherwise she’d be squeezed out due to property taxes.

Reverse mortgage?

The ability of cities in California to require landlords to report rents and vacancies is already well-established. For example in Berkeley landlords must report vacancies within 15 days of tenants quitting.

These are vacant houses, so they're not landlords. But good luck telling the difference between a house that's used 6 months a year and a house that's never occupied.

That’s a good point. The regime in Berkeley only kicks in after the first time the property is leased.

> Furthermore, investment homes do not get tax exemptions, so they're already taxed at higher rates than primary homes.

Are you referring to the almost comically small property tax reduction for primary residences? Or to the mortgage interest deduction?

I was referring to how other states do things (where primary residences get reduction in taxable value), unknowing that Prop 13 applied to all real estate in CA.

Finally, this is unenforceable without weekly spying to determine if a home is occupied or not.

Just ask the utility companies how much electricity and water are being used. No spying required.

What do you think will be more expensive: wasted water and electricity or this proposed tax?

In this country (UK), stamp duty land (the tax you pay when you buy a new house) is higher if you are buying a house that won't be your main residence, so taxing vacant homes is, in principle, a workable tax policy.

I'm sure there would be people that would try to work around the system, same as with every other law.

What do you think would be more expensive: a criminal conviction for fraudulently disguising property status, or this tax?

There's nothing criminal about owning a second house and using electricity. Maybe there's staff members keeping it clean. Maybe there's a pool pump that needs to run. You completely ignore the spectrum of utility consumption for completely vacant, minimally occupied, half occupied, etc. homes that exist on the market.

Investigating and prosecuting would be more expensive than either. Plus proving intent over “oh I forgot to check all my taps before I went out, whoops” is difficult.

Utility companies wrongfully deducing occupancy based on usage is an ever grater issue than the proposal to spy on one's utility usage.

FYI - your pitch is equivalent to spying on call metadata vs content, which has been proven to be dangerous enough

>> Just ask the utility companies how much electricity and water are being used. No spying required.

How will this be difficult to fake? Just run timers on some appliances, or buy up cheap cryptomining gear that mines at negative ROI and run it.

To get the perfect fake, just hire somebody to live in your vacant house!

Next up: captchas to turn on the stove. "We need to make sure you're a human that wants to prepare food and not just a weird property owner that wants to pretend that somebody lives here".

Interesting idea. I bet you might even find someone who would be willing to pay you to live there. Crazy idea, I’m sure…

How will this be difficult to fake?

Very easy, but it'd be tax evasion which is a serious crime.

Most taxes are pretty trivial to evade if you put some thought in to it. Very few people bother because the reward doesn't outweigh the risk. Saving a few tens of thousands of dollars a year isn't worthwhile if the penalty for being found out is losing everything you saved and years in prison. It's actually one of the few places in criminal law where the penalty actually works as a deterrent.

Indeed, it's worth noting that there's algorithms that can look at the waveforms of your smart meter and decide what appliances you have, often down to the make/model. It's called "disaggregation" in the industry.

See bidgely.com for one example.

>>"Finally, this is unenforceable without weekly spying to determine if a home is occupied or not. In other words it will cost more to enforce...."

Well, if they catch you, depends on the fine, you'll pay them all at once. They don't have to catch all, just make example of a few.

Jails are full and filling up of “examples”.

OK, how about a fine. So big that you really feel it

That's true, but many of them aren't in any way rational criminals. If you're a drug addict and your body tells you in no unclear terms that you need your fix no matter what you'll have to do to get it, you're not pondering the risk/reward. If you're a multi-million investor that is calculating whether tax evasion is a lucrative opportunity, you usually are: how much is there to be gained, how likely are you to get caught, and how harsh will the punishment be. If they can make an extra 10%, will get caught with a 50% chance and the punishment is having to pay back that 10%, many will do it. If the punishment is having to pay back that extra 10% + 100 times that, very few will.

This kind of tax exactly addresses the problem that Vancouver faced, that enough absent rich people bought houses that there were not homes for regular people and neighborhood businesses struggled or failed because few people lived there.

> this is unenforceable without weekly spying to determine if a home is occupied or not.

Or you can check if it was anyone's primary (and thus, tax) residence at any point in the year prior. Or check the utility consumption. Etc.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com