Berkeley’s ‘Effort to Right Wrongs of the Past’ Ends Single Family Homes

cawacko said:
We have Prop 13, property taxes in California are not high. If they were higher it might actually bring down costs.

The whole premise of the move in Berkeley is easing zoning restrictions to allow denser development.
Click to expand...

Prop 13 only applies to those how own and hold a property. When that property is sold the property taxes are adjusted to the current level with the new buyer. They don't get the say twenty years of stagnant property taxes the last owner got.

Making property only eligible for multi-unit housing doesn't "ease" zoning. That makes it more restrictive.
 
cawacko said:
We have Prop 13, property taxes in California are not high. If they were higher it might actually bring down costs.

The whole premise of the move in Berkeley is easing zoning restrictions to allow denser development.
Click to expand...

You also have a government funding process that is insane and prone to corruption and that demonstratively does not work.

Yet nothing is ever done about it.
 
domer76 said:
Zoning laws are unconstitutional?

Who the fuck told you that, dimwit?
Click to expand...

Zoning isn't "unconstitutional" but it is often unfair. Those with political connections and money can much more easily get zoning changed or a variance in it than some little guy can. Another way to screw the little guy is to put time limits on building permits. The government authority might say you have to get an inspection no less than every say four months to keep the permit open. The objective here is to eliminate do-it-yourselfers from building stuff, even when they do it 100% right.
 
T. A. Gardner said:
Zoning isn't "unconstitutional" but it is often unfair. Those with political connections and money can much more easily get zoning changed or a variance in it than some little guy can. Another way to screw the little guy is to put time limits on building permits. The government authority might say you have to get an inspection no less than every say four months to keep the permit open. The objective here is to eliminate do-it-yourselfers from building stuff, even when they do it 100% right.
Click to expand...

I was going by the wording of the OP, but now I see what's going on.
 
T. A. Gardner said:
Prop 13 only applies to those how own and hold a property. When that property is sold the property taxes are adjusted to the current level with the new buyer. They don't get the say twenty years of stagnant property taxes the last owner got.

Making property only eligible for multi-unit housing doesn't "ease" zoning. That makes it more restrictive.
Click to expand...

Sure, new sales get taxed at market then Prop 13 kicks in for them as well and annual property taxes are capped at 2% no matter how much the value increases.

When you go from only allowing single family in an area to allowing multi-family, that is not making zoning more restrictive if we're talking about building more housing. That is allowing for more housing to be built which is the purpose of all this (we have a housing shortage crisis).
 
How about this hundreds of millions of dollars bridge to nowhere that was being built for it...?

la-1532557692-a12bwgdwil-snap-image.jpg


It was costing about 1.85 billion per mile of track to build that porker.
 
T. A. Gardner said:
Zoning isn't "unconstitutional" but it is often unfair. Those with political connections and money can much more easily get zoning changed or a variance in it than some little guy can. Another way to screw the little guy is to put time limits on building permits. The government authority might say you have to get an inspection no less than every say four months to keep the permit open. The objective here is to eliminate do-it-yourselfers from building stuff, even when they do it 100% right.
Click to expand...

Money buys a lot of influence. But the guy who claims it is unconstitutional is an idiot.
 
War=Peace said:
S/he appears incapable of presenting a coherent, on-topic reply...
Click to expand...

The writing sucks too but these people who either cant read at the fifth grade level or pretend that they cant have been getting on my nerves lately. It seems like a Regressive Left tactic to keep the conversation from getting anyplace, because they know that if we all behaved as adults that their pet ideas would fail because they are garbage.
 
cawacko said:
Sure, new sales get taxed at market then Prop 13 kicks in for them as well and annual property taxes are capped at 2% no matter how much the value increases.

When you go from only allowing single family in an area to allowing multi-family, that is not making zoning more restrictive if we're talking about building more housing. That is allowing for more housing to be built which is the purpose of all this (we have a housing shortage crisis).
Click to expand...

No, you are talking about turning residential lots into commercial properties that don't fall under Prop 13 and putting renters in those properties perpetually. The California housing crisis is a self-made one by government.

All the owners of these new apartments will be big corporations and rich landlords. They'll use property management companies to deal with the tennants and the maintenance people will live somewhere else besides Berkeley. So, some guy like me will drive 30 miles or more to Berkeley to fix some apartment. They (like me) will charge a trip charge of $10 to $30 to make the drive, then charge $30 to $50 an hour to fix whatever the problem is plus materials at a 50% mark up, and all that will be tacked onto next year's rent increase.

So, Berkeley is likely to then impose rent controls and that's when these apartments all become slums because the owners know it's cheaper to be sued than fix them up.
 
Question: Who in their right mind is going to pay big money to become a landlord when the government has now proven that they might come along at any time and remove ownership rights causing massive losses?

Between that and all the folks fleeing the crime and other colossal failures of the state and local government property values are coming down, maybe hard.
 
T. A. Gardner said:
No, you are talking about turning residential lots into commercial properties that don't fall under Prop 13 and putting renters in those properties perpetually. The California housing crisis is a self-made one by government.

All the owners of these new apartments will be big corporations and rich landlords. They'll use property management companies to deal with the tennants and the maintenance people will live somewhere else besides Berkeley. So, some guy like me will drive 30 miles or more to Berkeley to fix some apartment. They (like me) will charge a trip charge of $10 to $30 to make the drive, then charge $30 to $50 an hour to fix whatever the problem is plus materials at a 50% mark up, and all that will be tacked onto next year's rent increase.

So, Berkeley is likely to then impose rent controls and that's when these apartments all become slums because the owners know it's cheaper to be sued than fix them up.
Click to expand...

I'm not talking about commercial properties. I'm talking about residential. When you buy a residential property in California you are taxed up to 1% of the purchase price. From that point on you pay a max of 2% increases in your annual property taxes, regardless of how much your property may increase in value.

You are correct, it is a government made housing crisis because we don't allow for enough supply to be built to keep up with demand. However you are also arguing we shouldn't allow new development because it will be owned by big corporations or rich LL's. The local democratic socialists make that same argument which is a big reason why we don't get new development and have the housing crisis we do.

You're not wrong in that poor people generally don't build new housing but who do you expect to develop new property if not people with money? And you can't put rent control on new development.
 
Hawkeye10 said:
Question: Who in their right mind is going to pay big money to become a landlord when the government has now proven that they might come along at any time and remove ownership rights causing massive losses?

Between that and all the folks fleeing the crime and other colossal failures of the state and local government property values are coming down, maybe hard.
Click to expand...

Your first sentence is saying gov't should continue to keep up artificial constraints to development to allow a higher profit for those lucky enough to be able to build.
 
cawacko said:
Your first sentence is saying gov't should continue to keep up artificial constraints to development to allow a higher profit for those lucky enough to be able to build.
Click to expand...

No, my first sentence was about COVID Martial Law.

Now we never know when the next time will be.

And how much it will cost property owners.
 
cawacko said:
I'm not talking about commercial properties. I'm talking about residential. When you buy a residential property in California you are taxed up to 1% of the purchase price. From that point on you pay a max of 2% increases in your annual property taxes, regardless of how much your property may increase in value.

You are correct, it is a government made housing crisis because we don't allow for enough supply to be built to keep up with demand. However you are also arguing we shouldn't allow new development because it will be owned by big corporations or rich LL's. The local democratic socialists make that same argument which is a big reason why we don't get new development and have the housing crisis we do.

You're not wrong in that poor people generally don't build new housing but who do you expect to develop new property if not people with money? And you can't put rent control on new development.
Click to expand...

Apartments are commercial properties. They are zoned multi-use residential not purely residential. Apartment complexes are generally owned by the wealthy or by corporations. The people renting them are not owners. The difference is that renters aren't owners whereas with owners in a property the value of the neighborhood generally doesn't decline dramatically like it will with lots of renters, particularly if that neighborhood is in a deteriorating part of town. Gentrification of older neighborhoods is better than turning them into run down slums
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top