Comment by zaptheimpaler
3 hours ago
This conveniently ignores all the gains in property value which they can benefit from by refinancing, selling or renting. If they don’t want to pay property taxes on higher values, and don’t care about the value, then we have a simple solution:
Freeze the property taxes and let the government take the entire value gain in the house when its sold.
> Freeze the property taxes and let the government take the entire value gain in the house when its sold.
I find this so funny, it completely takes the wind out of the sails of the parent comment's argument.
People really really want to have their cake and eat it too, and it's very difficult to convince them that it's not the natural way of things.
Parent comment shouldn't have a problem with it, but beyond rhetorical purposes (as in the reply) we should! Shifting tax structure from an ongoing basis towards transactions incentivizes people to hang onto houses in circumstances where they otherwise would not. E.g. retirement-age downsizing that would otherwise increase supply of family-sized housing. SDLT in UK has this effect.
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