I am not referring to broken water pipes and leaky roofs. I refer to what is commonly know as the American Dream. What is it? Owning one’s own home. Those without one pine over whether they will one day be able to achieve such. Those who begin the process often work two jobs or ungodly hours to afford a down payment and then embark on years of paying a mortgage. People strive, sweat and sacrifice over several decades just so they can own their home. Most everyone does this through borrowing. So, in the end, they often pay out fifty, one hundred, even two hundred percent more than the original price. It is a long, arduous and costly route hard working Americans travel, making the single largest purchase of their lives. Just to own their home. Just to live the American Dream.
Why do they bother? What is the reason people are willing to sacrifice so much? Is it materialism? Hardly. The investment value? A secondary reason, if at all. It is security in the present as well as in their old age. That is one major motive which causes people to take on such a daunting challenge.
Naive as it may sound, I wanted to own my home for the security it would give in my retirement years or through hard times. I figured I would always have a roof over my family's heads. Likewise, I foolishly thought that purchasing a home was like anything else one buys: after it is paid for it belongs to you. And as long as you maintain it, it will serve its purpose, and you own it to boot.
Foolish? Yes. For no one told me about the Property Tax. No one told me you don’t really own your home, you are renting it from your town. This is because property taxes are nothing more than rent. Fail to pay your taxes and you will be evicted. Evicted, regardless of whether you sweat and slaved all your life to own that home.
Worse, unlike any other tax which requires you to earn or spend something before you are obligated to pay it, property taxes are due merely because you “own” property. You might be unemployed. You might be disabled. You might be too old to work and on a very limited and virtually fixed income. The state does not care. Pay up, it says. Pay or else move out so we can sell your home to someone who can pay. This oppressive situation begins the minute you sign those papers to take “possession.” There is no other tax nor obligation we have that is like this.
Home ownership is a myth. It is not true. It is not real. We are all renters from the state. The only way to rectify this misconception is to eliminate the property tax. All the modification, tinkering, etc. to lessen its onerous nature will not change the facts. If we are subject to forfeiture of our homes for not paying a tax that has nothing to do with spending or earning an income then we do not own that property. But if there is no more property tax then we will have restored the right to private property. We will really own our home.
Only home owners (and renters who realize their rents include the “owner’s” property tax) can change this present injustice. It is up to them to write their senator and assemblymen that the jig is up and the property tax must be eliminated. Otherwise supposed benefits the American Dream of home ownership provides can only be believed through self-delusion, through believing a myth.
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6 comments:
It certainly makes no sense to spend 30 years paying your mortgage, only to discover that the house you just paid for will never, ever be yours, that the city/county remains the sole owner of the home and will cruelly snatch it right out from over your head. It has been said that the property tax is levied based on the fact that you'own' the house, but I say that the property tax is really levied based on the fact that you are borrowing/renting the home/property from the city/county/state government and/or the fact that you are living on government property.
Also, from reading the article, it even appears that the main mission of the Property Tax is to "rob the poor and give to the rich."
And in fact, by the way, there are only 3 places in the entire world that currently do not have a Property Tax, and they are; Costa Rica, the Cayman Islands, and the city of Saipan in the north Mariana Islands.
I meant, 3 places in the entire world that I know of that currently do not have a property tax.
Another big shock; a house's taxable value is barely fazed by a bargain price or even several bargain sales; property taxes are levied by what all other homes throughout the city/county sold for and by what the city/county thinks is the most appropriate selling price. This means, for example, that a house that sells for $80,000 can still be appraised at $200,000 right after the sale and get a $5,000 or $7,500 tax bill. More alarming; even if the property value does drop drastically throughout the city, the government will immediately respond and raise the millage rates, and since America, and really the entire world is in fact about 50 to 60 percent communist (because of the international Communist Manifesto signed into international law by Karl Marx), the local government can and will raise the millage rates as high as they want, even to as much as $100 or even $300 per $1,000 of taxable value, all of exactly what Karl Marx wanted. It is therefore obvious that Uncle Sam, and especially Karl Marx, wanted only rich and wealthy people to have a roof over their heads.
The truth is, the Property tax started with the Communist Manifesto which was written and then signed into international law by Karl Marx on February 21st, 1848. And one of the 10 planks of that global dictatorous manifesto was "abolition of all private property and application of rents to all property for government purposes."
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