San Francisco: Wealthy Residents Sue City, Buyers After Their Tax-Delinquent Street Sold

The wealthy residents of San Francisco's exclusive, gated Presidio Terrace haven't paid a $14/year tax bill for three decades. This led the city to auction off the tony street that boasts among its former residents House minority leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Senator Diane Feinstein (D-CA). The auction was an attempt to recoup its delinquent tax losses valued at less than a thousands dollars (including penalties, interest, etc.).

Officials hit the jackpot when a young couple purchased the street at auction two years ago for $90,100. The new owners are reportedly toying with the idea of charging residents and even outsiders (gasp!) to pay to park on their shiny new street.

Now the current residents of the street are outraged and have filed formal complaints and even a lawsuit in an attempt to rescind the sale.

Tina Lam and Michael Cheng snatched up Presidio Terrace -- the block-long, private oval street lined by 35 megamillion-dollar mansions -- for $90,000 and change in a city-run auction stemming from an unpaid tax bill. They outlasted several other bidders.
Now they're looking to cash in -- maybe by charging the residents of those mansions to park on their own private street.
Those residents value their privacy -- and their exclusivity. Past homeowners have included Sen. Dianne Feinstein and her financier husband, Richard Blum; House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi; and the late Mayor Joseph Alioto. A guard is stationed round the clock at the stone-gate entrance to the street to keep the curious away.
So imagine the residents' surprise when San Jose residents Cheng and Lam wound up with the street, its sidewalks and every other bit of "common ground" in the private development that has been managed by the homeowners since at least 1905. That includes a string of well-coiffed garden islands, palm trees and other greenery that enhance the gated and guarded community at the end of Washington Street, just off Arguello Boulevard and down the hill from the Presidio.
"We just got lucky,"said Cheng, a real estate investor.
. . . . The couple's purchase appears to be the culmination of a comedy of errors involving a $14-a-year property tax bill that the homeowners association failed to pay for three decades. It's something that the owners of all 181 private streets in San Francisco are obliged to do.
Two years ago, the city's tax office put the property up for sale in an online auction, seeking to recover $994 in unpaid back taxes, penalties and interest. Cheng and Lam, trawling for real estate opportunities in the city, pounced on the offer -- snatching up the parcel with a $90,100 bid, sight unseen.

The homeowners apparently only found out about the sale earlier this year, and they are moving to retake their street.

Curbed San Francisco continues, reporting on the couple's stated plans for the street:

“The sellers will still come out $millions to the good, and the homeowners will have no more tax bills. Everybody wins.”

Not so, the problem here is that instead of the street being apportioned to each adjoining property so that each resident pays his share of the city and county of SF’s property taxes, evidently the street was a separate taxable property. It does blow me away that the property taxes were only $14 per year. Looks like they have had a “special deal” on taxes for many, many years. Here in our neighborhood in the East Bay we live on a private road (seven homes) and each of us pays property taxes on the roadway which is simply an easement on each lot. On our acre and a half lot with a good-size home, property taxes are around $20,000 per year.

I would guess the $14 bill would be the same if the sale holds.

Looking at the story it looks like the Homeowners Association did not pay the bill. Usually they issue a dire warning before they auction off the property, but maybe that did not happen.

Although these are San Francisco fat cats, I do not rejoice.
This is a system screw up.

ROTFLMAO

I believe the owners have the responsibility to maintain mailing address with the county assessor for the express purpose of giving the assessor a way to send bills.

The assessor should have posted d notice on the street at the time of the action.

When I run property reports, there is always a mailing address for the owners which may or may not be the same as the address for the property.

Lastly they had an accounting firm and must have switched. the new firm had the responsibility to pay the tax bills, but ultimately the owners are responsible for what they hire the accountants to do.

That won't work. It's the taxpayer's responsibility to make certain his address as shown by the taxing authority's records is current. That was settled long, long ago, of course, since counties and cities that collect ad valorem tax do not have the time or resources to track down every address change for every taxpayer who fails to notify the taxing authority of a change in address.

Frankly, the slobs running this HOA sound like a pack of feckless, stupid boobs. Somehow, they managed to lose, through tax foreclosure, the one asset they were charged with managing, that is, the private street and the limited common elements of this subdivision. And all this arose over neglecting to pay ad valorem taxes totaling $14.00/year, for thirty years or so. If I was one of the HOA board members, I'd be looking for the nearest loaded firearm with which to blow my own useless head off. If they used their brains for target practice, that would apparently be the highest and best use to which their minds had ever been dedicated.

The street is gated, and it has been gated for 40 years. When DiFi lived there, they had a cop at the gate. Now, they have a security guard there. You and I (serfs) can’t enter because, as I was told by the guard, “It’s private property.”

Well now, ain’t that ironic? I couldn’t walk though because it’s “private property”, but somehow - AMAZINGLY - those great Dhimmicratic geniuses couldn’t figure out that they need to pay property tax on...PRIVATE PROPERTY.

BWA-HAHAHA!!! Auction the property off to the highest bidder, and let the residents eat cake!

PS: Bet the property tax is higher next year! BWA-HAHAHA!!

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