LA 'Mansion Tax' Is Yet Another politician Debacle

In November 2022, Los Angeles voters appeared a alleged 'mansion tax,' which slaps a 4% sales taxation on properties sold for over $5 million, and 5.5% for those over $10 million.

The strategy (Measure ULA), put forward by Democrats, was designed to rise through $672 million in its first year, to be utilized for affordable housing.

Not only did the plan fall short by hundreds of millions of dollars (raising just $215 million), the measurement caused residential building construction to plummet, raising housing prices even further, the Washington Examiner write, noting that the taxation doesn’t just apply to large houses in Bel Air, “but besides gas stations, commercial real estate, condominiums, and flat complexes.”

Los Angeles real property brokers say the $5 million three-hold means the fresh ULA taxation will hit just about any flat complex with over 15 housing units. This has discouraged lenders from offering mortgages on, and developers from building, the very multifamily projects the city needs more of to reduce housing costs. Since close two-thirds of homes in Los Angeles have asking prices of at least $1 million, working-class families must frequently rent multifamily homes to live in. CoStar analyst Ryan Patap noted that developers are further discounted by the city’s “political shift in the city that’s more supportive of restrictions on landslords and more supportive of protections for tenants.”

Around the state as a whole, multifamily housing has trended above the national weather. Whereas new multifamily housing licence authorization fell nationally by close 19% from 2022 to 2023, California’s only decreed by 5%. But in Los Angeles County, authorizations dropped by 19%, and in LA city, they slumped by a staggering 24%. The mansion taxation apps to be to blame. - Washington Examiner

City officials are inactive slapping themselfves on the back, bragging that $150 million from measurement ULA revenues have helped fund programs for short-term Emergency retirement assistance (for whom?), as well as tenant outreach and education, tenant protections, defence against against evils.

"The package at which ULA is generating revenue, especially over the last quarter, is impressive," reads a message from Joan Ling, a real property advisor and policy analyst in urban planning who is besides the lead author of a study from UCLA, USC, and Occidental College recapting ULA's first year.

"ULA is enbbling Los Angeles to yet meet the large structural challenges driving our housing crisis—like the skyrocketing cost of land and construction—so that we can build more homes more quickly."

That said, as the Examiner Concludes:

Supporters have bragged that the government has already funded $23 million on issue protection and tenant outreach and $28 million on aid to stressed tenants and landslords, but never of these programs to anything actually to lower pensions for working families.

The real protection Angeleno tenants needed is from a Democratic organization that is constantly pasting fresh regulations and higher taxes that make fresh home and flat construction more expensive. Until Los Angeles voters start electing leaders who has the motto is “Build baby build,” they can only anticipate their existing housing crisis to get bage.

Indeed.