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Old 07-01-2011, 03:33 PM
 
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It seems some senior near me just hold on to houses and never upgrade them. Are they getting tax breaks because taxes are high and I do not know how they can afford them.
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Old 07-01-2011, 03:39 PM
 
24,488 posts, read 40,980,792 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by fatboy111 View Post
It seems some senior near me just hold on to houses and never upgrade them. Are they getting tax breaks because taxes are high and I do not know how they can afford them.
Yes. When you become a senior citizen, your tax rate freezes and does not get hiked. My parents are paying half of what I pay in property taxes and they're house is worth a boatload more. The requirement is that they must be senior citizens (one of them) and have no one under 18 living with them.
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Old 07-01-2011, 04:55 PM
 
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Originally Posted by NJBest View Post
Yes. When you become a senior citizen, your tax rate freezes and does not get hiked. My parents are paying half of what I pay in property taxes and they're house is worth a boatload more. The requirement is that they must be senior citizens (one of them) and have no one under 18 living with them.

Additionally, their income must be no more than $70k per year.
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Old 07-01-2011, 05:18 PM
 
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This does not seem fair and seems to encourage people to stay in their houses longer. So a young couple with no kids should pay full taxes.
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Old 07-01-2011, 05:34 PM
 
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So how does it work when there is a school budget vote. Are the seniors allowed to vote since they have no stake in the vote as their taxes will not increase. It seems with no chance for their taxes to increase they would vote yes. But most I have heard vote NO.
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Old 07-01-2011, 05:47 PM
 
19,034 posts, read 25,104,119 times
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Originally Posted by fatboy111 View Post
This does not seem fair and seems to encourage people to stay in their houses longer.

Say it ain't so, Joe!

Is your solution to force older residents on fixed incomes out of their homes in order to allow younger folks to occupy these homes?
Shouldn't people be allowed to live out the last few years of their lives in their own home if they choose to live there?
Doesn't society need to somehow provide assistance to those whose health is waning and whose income is stagnant and badly impacted by inflation?

To me, this is a very frightening concept, and it seems like something out of the communist playbook.

What's next--putting Grandma on an random piece of ice, and letting the tides take her out to sea, as the Eskimos do with their elderly?
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Old 07-01-2011, 06:06 PM
 
6 posts, read 15,272 times
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Originally Posted by Retriever View Post
Say it ain't so, Joe!

Is your solution to force older residents on fixed incomes out of their homes in order to allow younger folks to occupy these homes?
Shouldn't people be allowed to live out the last few years of their lives in their own home if they choose to live there?
Doesn't society need to somehow provide assistance to those whose health is waning and whose income is stagnant and badly impacted by inflation?

To me, this is a very frightening concept, and it seems like something out of the communist playbook.

What's next--putting Grandma on an random piece of ice, and letting the tides take her out to sea, as the Eskimos do with their elderly?
you seem like a democrat. So they cannot sell their house and downsize. Should they live in a 3 or 4Bedroom house and pay less taxes so I have to pay more taxes. And then they should have Senior Buses for free. It is discriminatory to charge more based on age. But it is ok to charge less.
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Old 07-01-2011, 06:17 PM
 
2,499 posts, read 2,614,320 times
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Their taxes are not actually lower the State pays them any amount over the amount owed when the freeze went into effect on their house. The town receives the full amount of property tax.
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Old 07-01-2011, 06:30 PM
PDD
 
Location: The Sand Hills of NC
8,773 posts, read 18,292,121 times
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Since the largest part of your property tax is for the schools why should the seniors or anybody with no kids pay the same property tax as the overpopulationists with five or six kids?
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Old 07-01-2011, 07:19 PM
 
Location: Elsewhere
87,957 posts, read 83,773,798 times
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Originally Posted by fatboy111 View Post
This does not seem fair and seems to encourage people to stay in their houses longer. So a young couple with no kids should pay full taxes.
It is fair. A lot of my mother's friends are in this situation. They are in their eighties and living in the town that they were born and raised in and that in most cases their parents were born and raised in. They've lived in their houses for fifty years. They were the generation that built the schools and made the town what it is today. Twenty or so years ago, as long-time residents who owned land died off, the developers built large homes on every piece of available property and affluent younger couples swarmed in. The town became a hot place for real estate, and prices skyrocketed, along with the taxes.

Now these women's husbands are dead, their children are grown, they live on social security and whatever pensions their husbands got when they retired decades ago, and they are faced with enormous tax hikes. The town gives them a break, and that's the right thing to do. Their houses are paid for and the asset they have that will be there for them should they ever need long-term care.

Would you really want to live in a community that forces its elderly, long-time residents out for a few extra bucks on the tax rolls?
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