Not that I approve of extremely swift confirmations of controversial selections for Supreme Court, but my stomach would really like this all to be over quickly so that I can stop actually missing meals because my mother, who usually has been wont to go have a lie-down in the afternoon that gives me a window to grab lunch (even if it doesn't evenly split my workday in half as I would prefer), has decided to park it out in the kitchen all afternoon (plus her usual evenings) to watch the hearings and the associated Fox News commentary. And for some reason within the past couple of months she has started doing this around 10-11 in the morning, as well, which is when I had previously been getting breakfast, so now that's often late enough it's pretty much early lunch. (She usually goes to bed early enough we don't conflict over dinner, but I do occasionally have to wait her out on that too.)
In other news, I learned yesterday that Prop 19, which I thought I was unequivocally going to support, in fact does limit the transfer of lower taxed value to an inheritor even if the property continues to be used as a primary residence (the "family home" as the measure calls it). Here's the text:
* I.e. subdivision (b) of Section 2 of the California Constitution, Article XIIIA, which states: "The full cash value base may reflect from year to year the inflationary rate not to exceed 2 percent for any given year or reduction as shown in the consumer price index or comparable data for the area under taxing jurisdiction, or may be reduced to reflect substantial damage, destruction, or other factors causing a decline in value."
So if the home is not currently valued at more than $1 million more than its taxable value before the transfer, the taxable value stays the same. If it does exceed that number by more than $1 million, the taxable value will go up, possibly quite a lot. Say for example that our house's current taxable value is $120,000 and the market value is $2 million (which might be lowballing it). $2 million exceeds $1,120,000 (taxable value plus $1 million), so (B)(ii) applies, and we calculate $2 million minus that $1,120,000, yielding $880,000 as the value I now would pay tax on (7.33x the previous value).
My income is only about 60% of county median and 45% of ZIP code median, so we run the risk of being one of those sad tales of a low-income family being priced out of the only home they've ever had - per household size,![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
enotsola and I are somewhere between the "low income" and "very low income" categories of the local affordable housing program. (I do not know for certain, but I expect my parents, considered as a separate household because we generally do not share finances, are as well, because they have 1. Social Security, of which my mom gets little because she stopped working when I was born and never went back, and 2. IRA distributions, and I'm sure my dad takes the minimum of those the law will allow.)
But we could not likely afford to move (not that I want to) because there's nowhere to rent that comes out to less per year than the property tax would be, and if I attempt to sell then I pay a bunch of capital gains tax (I think it is) which might not leave me with enough to actually purchase a hypothetical home of lesser value without leaving the area -- and my job, and my 20 years' seniority, and health and other benefits -- entirely. (I mean, I suppose no law dictates what price I must sell for, but to way undersell it would leave even less and doesn't really solve the problem.) The only practical choice is to hope we can manage the tax, but it's going to go way up, and my wages aren't.
I know the principled thing to do is to vote for the tax change, and I do just about always vote to tax myself on all kinds of things like sales taxes and parcel taxes (which actually my parents are often exempt from due to age, but knowing I would eventually assume that tax burden), but when it could potentially cause the major personal harm of driving me and my husband out of our only viable shelter... iiit's hard to bring myself to do.
Argh. I really wish these kinds of stipulations would not be pegged to absolute numbers (just like the hardcoded year 1995 in Costa-Hawkins and $3 million threshold in Prop 15 are problems), because a number like a million may sound like a lot but can really vary extremely widely as to what it actually gets you. This house is not large (~1100 sq ft; yes, bigger than the homes in the older part of town, but nothing compared to what new construction is like) or fancy or on a big lot with improvements like a swimming pool - it's just in one of those places where values went bugfuck insane around it. I would rather some kind of percentage calculation - like "if the current market value of the property exceeds its assessed value by more than X percent then you only get to keep the lower assessment on the first Y percent".
In other news, I learned yesterday that Prop 19, which I thought I was unequivocally going to support, in fact does limit the transfer of lower taxed value to an inheritor even if the property continues to be used as a primary residence (the "family home" as the measure calls it). Here's the text:
The new taxable value of the family home of the transferee shall be the sum of both of the following:
(A) The taxable value of the family home, subject to adjustment as authorized by subdivision (b) of Section 2*, determined as of the date immediately prior to the date of the purchase by, or transfer to, the transferee.
(B) The applicable of the following amounts:
(i) If the assessed value of the family home upon purchase by, or transfer to, the transferee is less than the sum of the taxable value described in subparagraph (A) plus one million dollars ($1,000,000), then zero dollars ($0).
(ii) If the assessed value of the family home upon purchase by, or transfer to, the transferee is equal to or more than the sum of the taxable value described in subparagraph (A) plus one million dollars ($1,000,000), an amount equal to the assessed value of the family home upon purchase by, or transfer to, the transferee, minus the sum of the taxable value described in subparagraph (A) and one million dollars ($1,000,000).
* I.e. subdivision (b) of Section 2 of the California Constitution, Article XIIIA, which states: "The full cash value base may reflect from year to year the inflationary rate not to exceed 2 percent for any given year or reduction as shown in the consumer price index or comparable data for the area under taxing jurisdiction, or may be reduced to reflect substantial damage, destruction, or other factors causing a decline in value."
So if the home is not currently valued at more than $1 million more than its taxable value before the transfer, the taxable value stays the same. If it does exceed that number by more than $1 million, the taxable value will go up, possibly quite a lot. Say for example that our house's current taxable value is $120,000 and the market value is $2 million (which might be lowballing it). $2 million exceeds $1,120,000 (taxable value plus $1 million), so (B)(ii) applies, and we calculate $2 million minus that $1,120,000, yielding $880,000 as the value I now would pay tax on (7.33x the previous value).
My income is only about 60% of county median and 45% of ZIP code median, so we run the risk of being one of those sad tales of a low-income family being priced out of the only home they've ever had - per household size,
enotsola and I are somewhere between the "low income" and "very low income" categories of the local affordable housing program. (I do not know for certain, but I expect my parents, considered as a separate household because we generally do not share finances, are as well, because they have 1. Social Security, of which my mom gets little because she stopped working when I was born and never went back, and 2. IRA distributions, and I'm sure my dad takes the minimum of those the law will allow.)But we could not likely afford to move (not that I want to) because there's nowhere to rent that comes out to less per year than the property tax would be, and if I attempt to sell then I pay a bunch of capital gains tax (I think it is) which might not leave me with enough to actually purchase a hypothetical home of lesser value without leaving the area -- and my job, and my 20 years' seniority, and health and other benefits -- entirely. (I mean, I suppose no law dictates what price I must sell for, but to way undersell it would leave even less and doesn't really solve the problem.) The only practical choice is to hope we can manage the tax, but it's going to go way up, and my wages aren't.
I know the principled thing to do is to vote for the tax change, and I do just about always vote to tax myself on all kinds of things like sales taxes and parcel taxes (which actually my parents are often exempt from due to age, but knowing I would eventually assume that tax burden), but when it could potentially cause the major personal harm of driving me and my husband out of our only viable shelter... iiit's hard to bring myself to do.
Argh. I really wish these kinds of stipulations would not be pegged to absolute numbers (just like the hardcoded year 1995 in Costa-Hawkins and $3 million threshold in Prop 15 are problems), because a number like a million may sound like a lot but can really vary extremely widely as to what it actually gets you. This house is not large (~1100 sq ft; yes, bigger than the homes in the older part of town, but nothing compared to what new construction is like) or fancy or on a big lot with improvements like a swimming pool - it's just in one of those places where values went bugfuck insane around it. I would rather some kind of percentage calculation - like "if the current market value of the property exceeds its assessed value by more than X percent then you only get to keep the lower assessment on the first Y percent".