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This has been discussed in detail. How are their schools and other municipal services? Do they provide any? If you have more than one kid and you send them to private schools then NJ property taxes for decent schools is a good value...
Well it's a given the schools aren't as good down there. That's been proven time after time with empirical data. But they still do have schools...and police, fire department, sanitation, etc. So the same services are there. I guess my question is what are they paying these people down there...and how do they convince them to work for peanuts?
I think it's hilarious that you can go to a state like Georgia or North Carolina and pay $3k a year in taxes on a $750k house. I'd love to know how the municipalities down there have enough revenue to operate with such low tax levies.
They cut services. Fire departments are volunteers in a lot of towns. For example, when my mom's car caught on fire in the center of her SC town the police showed up and couldn't do anything to solve it and the fire department didn't get there for half an hour.
So, things like that happen.
GA has the highest dropout rate and schools that are ranked 35th.
NC spends the least on their teachers, they're somewhere in the 20's.
So, the answer is that they don't operate as well. Less in, less out.
Many southern states have county wide services. I winter in Fla. If I call the police a county sheriffs deputy comes, he could be 20 miles away. Schools are county wide. Services all county wide. So there is no police chief, school supt., public works director and so forth every couple of miles. There is an old saying, you get what you pay for.
Well it's a given the schools aren't as good down there. That's been proven time after time with empirical data. But they still do have schools...and police, fire department, sanitation, etc. So the same services are there. I guess my question is what are they paying these people down there...and how do they convince them to work for peanuts?
Because people live where they're going to live. If you want to be teacher but live near your mom, well, you take what you can get.
At the same time, school districts take what they get. My SC biology teacher took the week off when it came time to talk about evolution because she didn't believe in it. She wasn't a biologist, she was an administrator who had to take a teaching job. In the meantime, someone I know with a masters in biology was teaching history because that's what job was open.
So, it's a system that sucks and puts out middling students but taxes are low, so where's the problem?
Exactly. If someone doesn't think buying in NJ is a good real estate investment, then go buy a further cheap property in Wyoming. Let's compare whether the NJ or WY property appreciates more in 5 years.
Don't forget to subtract the $50,000 one paid in those 5 years for NJ property tax in that "appreciation" scenario.
Many southern states have county wide services. I winter in Fla. If I call the police a county sheriffs deputy comes, he could be 20 miles away. Schools are county wide. Services all county wide. So there is no police chief, school supt., public works director and so forth every couple of miles. There is an old saying, you get what you pay for.
So true. I had family that lived in Florida for several years, including my parents and brother. My mother had a lot of health problems and often needed to call for an ambulance. It would take, on average, about 45 minutes for the ambulance to arrive. My brother had the license plate stolen off his car once. It took the cops over three hours to arrive. When I was on vacation down there once, I saw a dog running loose in a mall parking lot. I saw a "friendly" police officer in a police car in the lot and told him about the dog. He went ballistic on me for bothering him. ("WHATD'YALLWANMETADOBOUTIT?!?")
I had a bad reaction to an antibiotic a few years ago and needed an ambulance. Seven people were at my door within two minutes. Good luck with that in Florida.
Taxes are expensive here because we get amenities unlike most other areas of the country. And any areas of the country offering similar levels of service have comparably high taxes. I'm not saying they can't be lowered some, but some people need to get real...
So true. I had family that lived in Florida for several years, including my parents and brother. My mother had a lot of health problems and often needed to call for an ambulance. It would take, on average, about 45 minutes for the ambulance to arrive. My brother had the license plate stolen off his car once. It took the cops over three hours to arrive. When I was on vacation down there once, I saw a dog running loose in a mall parking lot. I saw a "friendly" police officer in a police car in the lot and told him about the dog. He went ballistic on me for bothering him. ("WHATD'YALLWANMETADOBOUTIT?!?")
I had a bad reaction to an antibiotic a few years ago and needed an ambulance. Seven people were at my door within two minutes. Good luck with that in Florida.
Taxes are expensive here because we get amenities unlike most other areas of the country. And any areas of the country offering similar levels of service have comparably high taxes. I'm not saying they can't be lowered some, but some people need to get real...
This is absurd. I spend quite a bit of time in FL, have relatives there and it is simply UNTRUE. But hey, everyone has their own justification to make themselves feel better for their government confiscating their money.
So true. I had family that lived in Florida for several years, including my parents and brother. My mother had a lot of health problems and often needed to call for an ambulance. It would take, on average, about 45 minutes for the ambulance to arrive. My brother had the license plate stolen off his car once. It took the cops over three hours to arrive. When I was on vacation down there once, I saw a dog running loose in a mall parking lot. I saw a "friendly" police officer in a police car in the lot and told him about the dog. He went ballistic on me for bothering him. ("WHATD'YALLWANMETADOBOUTIT?!?")
I had a bad reaction to an antibiotic a few years ago and needed an ambulance. Seven people were at my door within two minutes. Good luck with that in Florida.
Taxes are expensive here because we get amenities unlike most other areas of the country. And any areas of the country offering similar levels of service have comparably high taxes. I'm not saying they can't be lowered some, but some people need to get real...
Have to agree this is the most absurd post I've seen in quite some time. Love the way you paint the entire state of Florida to some bumblef*** place you and your family had this experience....
It's not true that equalization ratio is 100% for new construction. Equalization ratio is uniform throughout the town. So if Ye Olde Murder House is assessed at $300,000 and has an FMV of $400,000, then a new construction house with an FMV of $800,000 will have an assessment of $600,000.
Yeah, that was my understanding also.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Craig-D
Sorry but you're mistaken. How do I know that? Because I actually happen to live in new construction. So my statement is not based on the theoretical or hypothetical. The tax assessment and the purchase price of my home (which is obviously FMV) are the same exact number.
But that can't be right. If the last reval in your town was long enough ago that all the properties in town are significantly below FMV, then the general tax rate is padded to reflect that. So buyers of brand new construction should NOT be paying that padded general tax rate that everyone else is.
For example, before West Orange had its reval in 2011, the general tax rate was something nutso like 13%. THIRTEEN. That's because $500,000 houses had a 1980's assessed value of $115,000.
So,if I had purchased a brand new construction house, in 2010, in West Orange, for $500,000...that means I would be taxed at 13%? That means my taxes would be $65,000...on a $500,000 house! Again, I think that that skewed/padded general rate (whether 13% when it should be 3%; or 3.5% when it should be 2.5%) would have to have the equalization ratio applied to it, for buyers of new construction. Not trying to be argumentative. I would really like to know what the deal is. There's gotta be some kind of established, official protocol in place for this kind of thing.
If not, they need to do revals every 2 years or something.
Franklin Lakes actually has much lower property taxes than Ridgewood. Saddle River has about the lowest or close to the lowest property taxes per $mil in the state.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Craig-D
That depends on the town. The upscale towns like Saddle River and Alpine have low tax rates (usually below 1%) because the rateables are so high with lots of multimillion dollar homes to go around. Contrast that with a town like Irvington, which has a tax rate over 5% - made necessary because the real estate isn't worth much.
Yeah, Harding is another town with below <1% taxes.
Saddle River, interestingly, is zoned specifically requiring every yard to be a minimum of 2 acres. There are 2-acre lots for sale in Saddle River for $1+ million. No house. Just land.
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