[hotpotamus]

Old people in Texas get their property taxes frozen I believe at 65. But honestly it might be better for them to downsize into something more appropriate and perhaps free up the larger houses for families. My mother has basically just turned my parents' house into an eBay warehouse full of junk that she intends to sell one day. I can't say that I have any big problem with that at the end of the day, but if you think getting young families into housing is a more important goal for society, then it does seem like a waste.

Meanwhile, I'm pretty sore about the 10% year over year thing, particularly when I hear about how Republicans run a low-tax state or that a wealth tax is unconstitutional/infeasible. I pay my wealth tax every year, but I suspect I'm too poor for the kind of wealth tax they mean. I can at least enjoy the irony.

[conductr]

> Old people in Texas get their property taxes frozen I believe at 65.

True but if you're turning 65 after you're tax bill has grown 10% for over a decade as your transitioning to your fixed income years; it's not a good thing just to freeze the tax bill. You might not have time to earn and save enough to cover the value it gets frozen at. It does help soften the blow for many though.

> But honestly it might be better for them to downsize into something more appropriate and perhaps free up the larger houses for families.

I wholeheartedly despise this line of thought, unless it's coming from their individual decision to downsize. You're basically treating the house like a commodity. It's a Home this person lived in, raised family in, hopes to continue hosting holidays in, where grandchildren can go to visit, etc. They should be able to use it until they decide to leave. On average, they only have another decade or so of life left anyway after their taxes get frozen at 65, let them enjoy their home.

[no_wizard]

If you despise that thinking, then we need to regulate the housing market to discourage seeing housing as an investment as we see it today. Everyone expects, more or less, for real estate to climb in value but nobody wants to square that with these other emotional ideas attached to housing.

It either is an asset or it’s a commodity as far as the market goes. If you want generational housing and for housing to be generally affordable something has to give. Kill it as an asset class and you get what you’re looking for.

10 years is a long time in the housing market. Assets sitting for 10 years under utilized is another way to think about it.

These two ideas - that housing is an investment and that people shouldn’t be incurring tax burdens on them like this - do not square

[hotpotamus]

I live with them rent-free so it would probably go against my own interest as well to force them out via pricing.