patrick.net

Even people who make $$ sometimes have a clue and see the debt and endless property taxes as a burden.

A place down the street from my friend is for sale for $1.4 million. The place is not large, and the most rent they could collect is $4000/month.

The property tax will be $1000+ per month ad infinitum. So, the $1.4 million investment will pay out $38,800 per year if that; 2.77% return on the $1.4 million.

Incidentally, my friend who sells real estate cannot do the previous calculation.

Wait, you can pay the mortgage with your wages; oh, those are taxed about 9.3% by California.

Wait, you can use an inheritance to pay for the house; those are taxed also by California.

Meanwhile, my illegal friends from Mexico who have various anchor children pay zero $ for their health care; they also get other assistance, and school feeds kids.

Sometimes it reminds me of the science fiction movie where the townspeople don't even realize that they're fuct and the place is run by zombies from space who have taken over.

BayArea says

The property tax will be $1000+ per month ad infinitum. So, the $1.4 million investment will pay out $38,800 per year if that; 2.77% return on the $1.4 million.

Incidentally, my friend who sells real estate cannot do the previous calculation.

I'd like to see your math since it seems you've left out quite a bit of data/information.

WineHorror1 says

BayArea says

The property tax will be $1000+ per month ad infinitum. So, the $1.4 million investment will pay out $38,800 per year if that; 2.77% return on the $1.4 million.

Incidentally, my friend who sells real estate cannot do the previous calculation.

I'd like to see your math since it seems you've left out quite a bit of data/information.

That math looks approximately correct to me...

If place rents for $4000/month that's $48k/year. However, after you pay $1000/month property taxes (which is low if you are paying the full taxes on $1.4 MM) you're down to something around $38,800 (actually a bit lower than that, but maybe his property taxes are merely $900/month). Given that you're taking in $38,800 in "profits" peryear, it's a return of 2.77% on your $1.4MM investment.

In reality, it's much worse than that for the homeowner when you consider insurance, wear-and-tear, hassle, poor liquidity, etc. The only potential upside for the homeowner is that the house price might go even higher! (or it might not!!!)

In my neighborhood (zip 94087) houses are more like $2MM and rents are FINALLY rising above $4k/month. Return on investment for renting out a place is even more crazy. The only upside I can figure is that you won't pay enormous capital gains if you sell a place; instead you string along small income yearly.

The person who is most screwed is my neighbor; she bought the cute place for about $750,000
Her taxes are at least $7500/year, likely higher because of the location.

So she needs a next egg that's pretty huge to be able to create the income just to pay the property tax.

Wait! She likely pays 1. Federal 2. State income taxes if she uses a pension, IRA, 401K, annuity, etc. for her income.

So she is taxed to death in her "golden years." It's really amazing.

clambo says

So she is taxed to death in her "golden years." It's really amazing.

She needs to fucking move PRONTO.

clambo says

Her taxes are at least $7500/year, likely higher because of the location.

At least. Likely much more, with all the parcel taxes, extra assessments, "junk fees", etc. Some are flat parcel taxes, others are a percentage of assessed value.

Our bill in SJ is a bit more than 1.5% of the assessed value.

When the ®ealtor says the tax is 1.00%, it's the third biggest lie in the world.

At less than a thousand dollars per square foot, bargains abound in Crapertino.
https://www.redfin.com/CA/Cupertino/19230-Tilson-Ave-95014/home/1777971
Have you ever seen a more beautiful facade?

Silly EBGuy.

They don't care about price per sq ft, curb appeal, SFH vs converted garage or converted 1960's genre apartment unit or whatever. They don't care about any of those trivial things. They don't even care if it's actually within the boundaries of the municipality of Cupertino.

It's all about the enrollment area of those coveted Cupertino schools that feed into the coveted Lynbrook or Monta Vista.

Median can change based on mix, even if home prices aren't falling. That said Redfin is showing a 9.67% drop in the price per square foot in Crapertino over the past year. There appear to be a lot of Prop 13 protected homeowners (or their heirs) selling these days. Fasten your safety belts...

SunnyvaleCA says

In reality, it's much worse than that for the homeowner when you consider insurance, wear-and-tear, hassle, poor liquidity, etc.

Bingo bango. It's all about hoping for perpetual increases in value. Price appreciation.

Guys, there's square miles of office parks with warrens of cubicles full of gaokao genufletcors who will jump in to scoop those up. It sets a floor on the prices, which, compared to where these folks came from, still The Wide Open (uncongested) Prairie, at Bargain Prices.

Welcome to what the Bay Area / Silicon Valley has become.

http://www.ocregister.com/homebuying-in-anaheim-orange-villa-park-tumbles-10-in-worst-may-for-o-c-in-5-years


10% drop in house sales in Orange County

Equity upside in the Silicon Valley over the next few years? I don’t think so.

By the way, nobody is buying Silicon Valley homes today for rental purposes. Rentals you see in this area come from landlords that bought years ago.

Todays price:rent ratios in the Silicon Valley don’t make any sense for landlords.

It’s always fun to see a whole bunch of people on Patnet discussing about housing. Some of these same people have been arguing about the same damn things since the bottom of the housing market till now. Bravo! 👏🏼

Bay Area made a couple of good points while tovarichpeter posted half truth data without the whole picture as usual. 😳

SunnyvaleCA says

place rents for $4000/month

'

My apartment in downtown Boston rents for $2.5K and I expense $1K to my firm as an auxiliary office. My low cost home in central MA is paid off in full.

So for $1500/month, I'm living a lifestyle (downtown w/ free livery service by the firm) which I only dreamed about when I was a kid. Seriously, ppl don't know the value of money these days.

These parents could easily hire tutors to educate their kids over living in Cupertino, just for the school system.

Again, maybe there are few nice enclaves and very few nicer hoods in SF left, but it is batshit crazy that people paying anything over $100k to live in a city that literally smells of piss and shit, has the dirtiest sidewalks and worst streets ever and homeless hobos and diverse motherfuckers constantly fucking shit up. If you bought a home in SF you've been had! Maybe you can unload it quickly to the next sucker/bagholder.

mell says

Again, maybe there are few nice enclaves and very few nicer hoods in SF left, but it is batshit crazy that people paying anything over $100k to live in a city that literally smells of piss and shit, has the dirtiest sidewalks and worst streets ever and homeless hobos and diverse motherfuckers constantly fucking shit up. If you bought a home in SF you've been had! Maybe you can unload it quickly to the next sucker/bagholder.

Cupertino is about 40 miles from SF as crow flies.

Hugolas_Madurez says

mell says

Again, maybe there are few nice enclaves and very few nicer hoods in SF left, but it is batshit crazy that people paying anything over $100k to live in a city that literally smells of piss and shit, has the dirtiest sidewalks and worst streets ever and homeless hobos and diverse motherfuckers constantly fucking shit up. If you bought a home in SF you've been had! Maybe you can unload it quickly to the next sucker/bagholder.

Cupertino is about 40 miles from SF as crow flies.

True but I know the bay area pretty well and have not been convinced of a specific part in light of the monster prices. Cupertino is nice, there are some nice areas in the Santa Cruz Mountains, Los Altos/Los Gatos/Aptos, maybe Half Moon Bay if you can take the perma-fog and the one way in and out congested freeway, maybe maybe Belmont. But most towns on the peninsula and south bay / east bay (maybe Sunol) are not worth it either. It is a beautiful landscape by the Ocean and GG Park and the Presidio are nice too, but it does not justify the prices. If you drive down 101 and look left and right you get the feeling this is a slightly underdeveloped country. Plus roads are shit. SF is great for singlre up and coming, work hard, play hard. I had some of my best years here so it's a love/hate relationship. Once you reach family life though it's time to leave the bay area, with maybe a few exceptions. Still homes have been chronically overprices as a result of prop13 and the proximity to Asia. The leftoids will manage to ruin it eventually.

I enjoyed SF as a young 20-something... so much energy and so much to do. I have a lot of great memories.

But since then...

- got married and have two young kids
- liberals here have gone off the rails here
- homelessness is worse than I’ve seen it in my lifetime.

It just feels increasingly like leaving is the right thing to do.

Leaving the high prices is always a good idea if you like the security of having a good supply of money.

Someday I will be so old and lazy I won't care about how superior the summer weather is in California.

If I started to spend my IRA, SEP IRA, Roth IRA, and other things with social security my California income tax will be $9000+ .

I'm likely not going to want to pay it. So, Florida may be in my future years from now.

This afternoon I was strolling in Santa Cruz and I counted 10 bums and a few kooks. They bring you down after seeing them everywhere.

Patrick says

From the guy who sent it:

My wife sent it to me. I think she found it on Zillow. Zip code 95014.

Many realtors fliers even today's listing between 2.5-4.0 range, 2.1 considered to be lower end around this area. There are other factors in this area that schools are not getting enough kids to keep all the staff. Not alarming level yet, but because of lack of homes on the market to move in families with kids. Plenty of tech RSU/options around that still drive prices even higher down the road.
Repealing/reforming Prop-13 might level it off some extent.

Rin says

These parents could easily hire tutors to educate their kids over living in Cupertino, just for the school system.

Rin,
they do that, too.

There's a Rat Race to differentiate oneself from the other 20 or so valedictorians in the class. Average GPA exceeds 4 because of the bonus points from the AP classes.

Lots of private tutoring going on to goose the gaokaoSAT scores. Because excellent scores are nothing special in these cohorts. Tiger Parents "help" (or hire coaches to help) them start entrepreneurships as a way to differentiate themselves. That would be in addition to, not instead of, all the other privileged excellence.

WineHorror1 says

BayArea says

The property tax will be $1000+ per month ad infinitum. So, the $1.4 million investment will pay out $38,800 per year if that; 2.77% return on the $1.4 million.

Incidentally, my friend who sells real estate cannot do the previous calculation.

I'd like to see your math since it seems you've left out quite a bit of data/information.

We bought in Danville in 2012 and the place has doubled in value (currently ~$1.2M) but I keep hearing that houses aren't selling here as they did in the past so that figure appears to be very fluid. My wife and I have tried repeatedly to get out of this market and return to Ohio but we can't. Our skills have no value there and they won't.

Rin says

These parents could easily hire tutors to educate their kids over living in Cupertino, just for the school system.

With the revealing of the racially/disadvantaged weighted SAT scores, which are based on the school system and how disadvantaged it’s purported to be, a good strategy might be to enroll your Tiger Kid in a shitty school and then have them be the valedictorian from there with great SAT scores. Checking the boxes and all that.

BayArea says

I enjoyed SF as a young 20-something... so much energy and so much to do. I have a lot of great memories.

But since then...

- got married and have two young kids
- liberals here have gone off the rails here
- homelessness is worse than I’ve seen it in my lifetime.

It just feels increasingly like leaving is the right thing to do.

Agreed

mell says

Hugolas_Madurez says

mell says

Again, maybe there are few nice enclaves and very few nicer hoods in SF left, but it is batshit crazy that people paying anything over $100k to live in a city that literally smells of piss and shit, has the dirtiest sidewalks and worst streets ever and homeless hobos and diverse motherfuckers constantly fucking shit up. If you bought a home in SF you've been had! Maybe you can unload it quickly to the next sucker/bagholder.

Cupertino is about 40 miles from SF as crow flies.

True but I know the bay area pretty well and have not been convinced of a specific part in light of the monster prices.

But still, "piss and shit on the street and dirty hobos everywhere" is pretty SF-specific. Nothing of the kind is happening in Cupertino (yet). It is overpriced but not derelict. SF is both.

B.A.C.A.H. says

Lots of private tutoring going on to goose the gaokaoSAT scores. Because excellent scores are nothing special in these cohorts. Tiger Parents "help" (or hire coaches to help) them start entrepreneurships as a way to differentiate themselves. That would be in addition to, not instead of, all the other privileged excellence.

How about simply getting a college degree instead of high school altogether?

I mean it's easier for a so-called child prodigy, with a bachelors, to get into a master's program at let's say Univ of Chicago or Duke over the undergrad, since elite undergrad schools need to appeal to the lazy rich kids who will later donate millions like an Al Gore or John Kerry type. Remember, you'll never see a stupid rich person in a masters in applied physics program because only stupid middle class types believe that STEM education vs greasing the wheels of management consulting is of value.

clambo says

Leaving the high prices is always a good idea if you like the security of having a good supply of money.

Someday I will be so old and lazy I won't care about how superior the summer weather is in California.

If I started to spend my IRA, SEP IRA, Roth IRA, and other things with social security my California income tax will be $9000+ .

I'm likely not going to want to pay it. So, Florida may be in my future years from now.

This afternoon I was strolling in Santa Cruz and I counted 10 bums and a few kooks. They bring you down after seeing them everywhere.

I'm thinking the exact same thing. Also, California taxes capital gains at the same rates as income, so in California the tax is 1/2 x (not 1/3x) the federal tax. I figured I could sell my shack here, pay the enormous capital gains taxes, pay the enormous real-estate cartel fees, pay for moving expenses, and STILL buy a $1MM property somewhere outside California with the proceeds. Buying $1MM outside California is actually hard for me, because I wouldn't really want a house more than 2000 square feet — there's nothing that "small" that is desirable.

So far I've been looking at Florida places in Cape Coral, Apollo Beach, Pt Charlotte, and Marco Island. The requirements are... not more than 20 years old, not huge, and direct sailboat access to the gulf. "Direct sailboat access" means no short bridges and not too far either. I wouldn't even think about living inland in Florida; I don't think I could abide living in a swamp.

The lady that cuts my hair just got back from holiday, much of which was going up and down the coasts of Florida and the Keys. She said she was amazed that she didn't see homeless, and people wore red MAGA hats in public without being harassed. She claimed the areas she saw were clean and cost effective on the water compared to Cali.

She is from Central America, does not like illegals since she came in the 'right' way, voted for Trump, and finds the third world ethnic stew and the insane, oppressive PC crap of Cali depressing. She's a goose stepping fascist compared to me.

Rin says

How about simply getting a college degree instead of high school altogether?

Quigley says

a good strategy might be to enroll your Tiger Kid in a shitty school

What is a shitty school? Is it a school without outstanding API ranking? API is an average for the whole school, "your kids performance may vary".

A shitty school, would be a school with no opportunities to excel, and where kids are in physical safety. That would be a shitty school.

There's lots of choices in between Cupertino gaokao-prep elite API, and shitty schools. Lots of schools with mediocre API, but opportunity for the Little Tigers to excel. Those schools with mediocre API send lots of kids to elite universities. But they send even more to community colleges, the military, and lower tier colleges. Tiger Parents don't want their kids to be influenced by such "slackers".

There's also racism. Mediocre schools that have opportunities to excel, reflect the ethnic diversity of the state. And that would include latinos, vietnamese, filipino, and blacks. Increasingly nowadays, there's even a racism against whites as Slackers. Tiger Parents don't want their kids around these folks. I worked with Tiger Parents for decades in tech jobs in Silicon Valley. This was everyday kind of water cooler talk.

To SunnyvaleCA,

There are some nice parts of Florida which I didn't see; but the weather will be generally warmer on the Gulf side, and the ocean water not as clear and blue as on the Atlantic side where the Gulf Stream hits the coast.

The reports I hear is that the northern retirees on the Gulf side tend to be from the Midwest and the New Yorkers go to the Atlantic side. You should see fewer guys with gold chains stuck in their back hair at the gym and fewer Yankee hats.

I think with the tax money saved living in Florida you could stay in California for a month in an AirBnB or similar, then a month in Europe, then watch TV in the afternoons in your AC comfort; "mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the noonday sun".

My NY relatives have been migrating to the Atlantic coast of Florida. But being Long Islanders, you'd never see them wearing any Yankee stuff. Go Mets!