“Housing prices, of course, are famously irrational. In Sunnyvale, a modest 848-square-foot home on a tiny lot gained national notoriety for its selling price. After being listed in March for $1.45 million, it sold within 48 hours for $2 million, or $2,358 per square foot, noted ZeroHedge. With Sunnyvales 1.25 percent property tax, the new owners are paying $2,083 per month, or $250,000 every 10 years.”
That’s surely true for Sunnyvale, which is in the heart of the Silicon Valley and woefully short of housing. But the people who sold that 848 sf home, if they lived in it for 20 years, probably paid less than $100,000 for it and were paying $100 a month in taxes thanks to Prop 13. If the RATs are ever successful in somehow overturning Prop 13, the CA real estate market will implode.
And prop 13 is only great for those who've lived in their homes for a long long time. The poor souls who are trying to buy now? They're getting economically gang raped paying 10x property taxes what their neighbor is.