When I put my girlfriend (now wife) on my deed, I was reassessed for this new “partner”. Of course I cannot purchase legislation or get “lawyered up” like Disney. Split roll would correct a situation that is fundamentally unfair. When Prop 13 was passed corporations paid 80% of the property taxes and residences 20%. That has completely reversed as individuals like myself have been constantly reassessed, I, 3 times due to my girlfriend and 2 remodels. Now residences pay 80% of the property taxes and corporations 20%, (approximately). This sky will fall report is baloney and the large corporations, as with the income tax, will never pay their fair share. But they will spend hundreds of millions if split roll ever make it to the ballot to protect their unfair privilege over us working stiffs.

As far as I know the only residents that want to mess with prop 13 are the retired teachers and state workers. They want their platinum plated retirements to keep rolling in no matter what the long term damage is.

I’m glad this was verified by our higher education institution research.

Aren’ t you alarmed? It really could destroy property values…job loss is nothing vs net worth loss….

Those of you who have little and run your mouths….you best hope someone is out there to stop all this maddnesd!

I am shaking my head at this article and the study. And the idea that one piece of legislation written in 1978 is going to save the world.

Next.

I too was very disappointed in the Pepperdine study. Thanks for detailing its deficiencies.
WL

First, the report never once considers that half the commercial properties in California have changed hands since 2000 and are valued at or near market. So how would revaluing them to market, where they are already, have any effect?

Second, it never considers that 80% of the Prop 13 benefits for business (which they use a Board of Equalization Railroad Valuation estimate to guesstimate) are vested in fewer than 20% of commercial properties, those with assessment bases before 1980.

If this were a scholarly research paper, rather than funded research for the mysterious “Small Business Action Committee,” one might expect that the authors would have done some actual research. (Especially since Pepperdine sits in Los Angeles County, whose assessment rolls can be easily bought and analyzed by property type, assessment base year, etc.)

But why do original research when you have the IMPLAN modeling system, v. 3.0, from Minnesota to fill in any assumptions you care to make?

Third, while they lean heavily on the concept of Triple-Net commercial lease terms, they don’t appear to have confirmed the actual nature of such terms in the 20% of the properties making up 80% of the $6 (estimated) tax that would be collected. Had they done so, they would have learned that most of those properties are protected by cap provisions on their triple-net commitment. Such caps are standard in commercial real-estate, but especially prevalent in these property leases since there is a significant chance that the owners (who have been enjoying Prop 13’s protections for 30 years already) might die, sell, or otherwise transfer the properties, triggering a tax increase.

It’s no surprise that, in the preface of the report, the authors state “The opinions, discussion and analysis contained in this report of [SIC] those of the authors alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of Pepperdine University, the School of Public Policy, the Davenport Institute or those who have provided support, financial or otherwise, for this research.”

Read the report yourself and see whether you, too, are inclined to run, not walk, away from espousing its overblown conclusions.

They could never eliminate Prop 13 for residential properties or for most commercial properties without causing an economic depression that would make 1929-30 look like a Sunday school picnic. Real estate values would plummet causing a flood of foreclosures that would result in a chain reaction of economic disasters.

But don’t expect the big boys to play fair. When you own the rule makers the game is always tilted in your favor.

But the loopholes for the Too Big To Fails must end. They should pay their fair share like all the rest do.