New Vehicle Laws in California

[YellowThumper]

And the "homeless" population has increased 40% in the last 5 or so years.
Chasing the rainbow of increased free handouts.

[1Burgfish]

  You forgot the new undocumented migrants added to the rolls with the homeless...

[Cudakiller70]

Dude we have Surfing, oh schools last reported we are 50th, not bad out of 57?

[dodj]

Hmmmmm. Up here in Northern Ontario Canada all we hear is it never rains in 'Sunny California" and everything is awesome there. Doesn't sound awesome from those of you living there?
From those of you living there, where would a better place be? I'm knee deep in snow at the moment....lol.

[Cudakiller70]

Hmmmmm.
From those of you living there, where would a better place be? I'm knee deep in snow at the moment....lol.

Yup.....that's what our family is trying to figure out right now. We are currently looking at Idaho, but the temperature high there is our low here. And I'm not getting any younger to deal with a whole bunch of snow and or ice. Though I'm told the snow season is very short  My dad left Canada, California had it going on, now not so much.

[nsmall]

So much hate for those who dont live here.   

I have only lived here 15 years.  My 2-5 year plan is to move to Northeastern Washington or North Idaho (where I grew up) and freeze our butts off.  I love snowmobiling and snowboarding so I dont mind winters.  Hopefully my wife doesnt leave me. 

Its too crowded and expensive for my taste here.  It has been a great place to live and I do love my job so its tough to leave.

I would love to raise my kids on 10 acres in the forest so its about time to 

[dodj]

I would love to raise my kids on 10 acres in the forest so its about time to 

I'm sitting on 20 acres of forest. It's a great place IMO. I'm sure there are other great places though. Knowing nothing about  California, other than it never rains there, I am surprised at the comments residents there have made. Not saying it not true, I don't know, but I thought it was one of the better places to live in North America. Along with Florida. 

[70 Challenger Lover]

Hmmmmm. Up here in Northern Ontario Canada all we hear is it never rains in 'Sunny California" and everything is awesome there. Doesn't sound awesome from those of you living there?
From those of you living there, where would a better place be? I'm knee deep in snow at the moment....lol.

I just got back from Nashville last week and it was amazing. The low was around 42 which was exactly what it was at home. Granted it gets colder in February but I can live with mid 20s. Beats the yearly firestorms and quarterly 70 mph sustained Santa Ana winds.

[IRON MAN]

I live 1/2 mile from the gateway to the SF Bay Area Delta. It rains here about 4 months a year. Today, we have a slight drizzle with tule fog all day. SOCAL is a bit too dry for me. Here is a picture I took ten months ago looking out the front window. The SF Bay Area has micro climates. Danville is wetter than most cities. SF is a whole lot cooler! San Jose is inundated with smog. I lived in Oakland for four years and the weather there is close to perfect. My son lives in Humboldt County and he said it rains too much up there. I have friends who would never consider leaving the SF Bay Area.

[HP_Cuda]

About Prop 13: I can tell you my Mom makes out being under Prop 13 as of 1978 but everyone else then picks up the tab. I remember the last place I had I was paying over 10k a year just in property taxes so that didn't make me very happy. Prop 13 came about because of high inflation in the 70's but then was fairly tame since.

Living in CA has it's pluses and minuses:
1) Weather - it has been nice up till say about 7 years ago when every friggin year was hotter than the last. Makes me feel like living in Vegas full time, not to mention the water worry all the time and the huge fines for watering your lawn.
2) A decent amount of high paying jobs - although this is true you also have to figure in the higher prices for everything else. Gas, Housing, Food, etc. It's like they know you are fish in a barrel and treat you accordingly.
3) High Density housing and traffic - LA is a joke for traffic and up here in the Bay Area it's gotten worse to the point where you don't want to leave work till after 7pm. Basically city councils line their pockets with developer money and build 5+ story high density housing and claim there is a housing shortage and charge and arm and a leg. It's just downright stupid.

So in a nutshell - I want to move somewhere where I cannot see my neighbor for 2+ miles and I own many acres, lower cost of living, slower pace of life, and an area which I enjoy. Not too much to ask eh?

Governor Brown's legacy is a  $6.1 BILLION budget surplus when he left office last week. Most of this money came from the gas tax. In 2018, California's economy surpassed that of the United Kingdom to become the 5th largest economy in the world. This attracts a lot of talent and money. There are far more people moving to California than leaving. People are coming here to join the parade, or as my brother in Huntington Beach says "Chasing the rainbow."

[70 Challenger Lover]

About Prop 13: I can tell you my Mom makes out being under Prop 13 as of 1978 but everyone else then picks up the tab. I remember the last place I had I was paying over 10k a year just in property taxes so that didn't make me very happy. Prop 13 came about because of high inflation in the 70's but then was fairly tame since.

This is the kind of thinking the Ca. government wants. Prop 13 helps all homeowners and people need to understand it fully before we toss it away.

Prop 13 has several components to it but the biggie is that it sets tax at 1% of purchase price and can only go up a tiny amount each year. This allows people to set long term budgets.

Example: Bought my first house for $175k and the tax was around 2k per year after all the stupid little add on taxes that voters keep approving (mostly school bonds). After living there for ten years, I sold the hous for 450k but my taxes was only about $2300.

I then bought another house for $440k and my taxes were around $5k annually. I've been here for 15 years now. When the market crashed, my taxes went lower for many years. Now that the market has recovered, my house is worth far more than $440k but my taxes are only a little bit higher than when I first bought it.

Without prop 13, they can reassess your house each year and you get a surprise tax bill. Imagine trying to budget getting,ids through college and find that your house goes up in value so your taxes keep jumping up each year. True that elderly benefit most but what's the harm in that? So many are on fixed incomes and couldn't afford to retire if their taxes kept going up. My parents lived in a nice home in Jacksonville for years. They got a new football team and the city jacked up everyone's prop tax to pay for the new stadium. My parents were eventually forced to move away because their taxes went from 4K to over 10k in just a few short years.

A 10k prop tax bill comes from buying a 1.1 million dollar house. Without prop 13, a 2% prop tax rate like many other states have would get you a yearly tax bill over 20k. Don't be too quick to wish prop 13 away.

As far as the rest of us picking up the tab, that depends on how you look at it. If you have a runaway government that wants to increase spending to pay for all its programs, then I guess everyone has to pony up and pay more. That would include those damned old people who are breathing our air and taking up space. Retired folks probably have the crazy viewpoint that they worked hard all their lives and just want to spend the rest of their days living in the same home they always have without being told that they aren't doing enough for the rest of society.

All your other points are spot on. I'm glad people love it here. I want one of them to pay me top dollar for my house when I move out of state.

[Katfish]

Don't know how you guys pay for it.
I live in FL, a few yrs ago company decided to move our dept to CA.
VP came in to sell us on the move, when 1 guy mentioned it would cost 50% more to have the same size house and standard of living, he just smiled and said "the weather is awesome".
Of the 100 offered the 10% raise to go, only 5 went.
3 yrs later, 4 of those have moved back.

[70 Challenger Lover]

Don't know how you guys pay for it.
I live in FL, a few yrs ago company decided to move our dept to CA.
VP came in to sell us on the move, when 1 guy mentioned it would cost 50% more to have the same size house and standard of living, he just smiled and said "the weather is awesome".
Of the 100 offered the 10% raise to go, only 5 went.
3 yrs later, 4 of those have moved back.

This gave me a good laugh...so true.  I tell people here in Ca. that we plan to leave here and the only response I EVER hear is, "but the weather is so good here". I have never heard any other reason to stay.

I have known at least 50 co-workers who have retired and left the state. In each case, everyone at work said they will back eventually because the weather is simply too good hear. After 28 years, only one person has ever returned and he did so only because most his family is here and his wife threatened divorce if he didn't. He still hates it here.

I have been comparing costs here vs. Tennessee and I'm going to save a major boatload of money every month once we leave. Enough for me to buy lots of plane tickets to Ca. so I can take in the incredible weather.

[YellowThumper]

To put in perspective of here v/s anywhere.
It doesn't seem to matter where you go.

Mom to Washington St.
Brother to Washington St.
Sister to Washington St. Moved at different time.
Brother (another) to Oklahoma.
Cousin to Wisconsin
Aunt to Wisconsin
Friends to Oregon, Arizona, Nevada,Texas, Colorado, Wisconsin.

ALL took the leap and none would ever consider returning.

[HP_Cuda]

Under Prop 13 they did reassess my home value every year and Mr. Sloan loved asking me for more $$$ every year.

So if you moved into a house and paid 10k a year in Property Tax and your neighbor has been there awhile and pays only 3k a year wouldn't you be pissed? Same services, same police, same stupid crap and on top of it all they have the gall to ask for more $$$ to support(donate) the schools!! WTF?

I understand your side of the story and we can both agree this place is absolutely broken. I'm leaving within 2 years or so.

About Prop 13: I can tell you my Mom makes out being under Prop 13 as of 1978 but everyone else then picks up the tab. I remember the last place I had I was paying over 10k a year just in property taxes so that didn't make me very happy. Prop 13 came about because of high inflation in the 70's but then was fairly tame since.

This is the kind of thinking the Ca. government wants. Prop 13 helps all homeowners and people need to understand it fully before we toss it away.

Prop 13 has several components to it but the biggie is that it sets tax at 1% of purchase price and can only go up a tiny amount each year. This allows people to set long term budgets.

Example: Bought my first house for $175k and the tax was around 2k per year after all the stupid little add on taxes that voters keep approving (mostly school bonds). After living there for ten years, I sold the hous for 450k but my taxes was only about $2300.

I then bought another house for $440k and my taxes were around $5k annually. I've been here for 15 years now. When the market crashed, my taxes went lower for many years. Now that the market has recovered, my house is worth far more than $440k but my taxes are only a little bit higher than when I first bought it.

Without prop 13, they can reassess your house each year and you get a surprise tax bill. Imagine trying to budget getting,ids through college and find that your house goes up in value so your taxes keep jumping up each year. True that elderly benefit most but what's the harm in that? So many are on fixed incomes and couldn't afford to retire if their taxes kept going up. My parents lived in a nice home in Jacksonville for years. They got a new football team and the city jacked up everyone's prop tax to pay for the new stadium. My parents were eventually forced to move away because their taxes went from 4K to over 10k in just a few short years.

A 10k prop tax bill comes from buying a 1.1 million dollar house. Without prop 13, a 2% prop tax rate like many other states have would get you a yearly tax bill over 20k. Don't be too quick to wish prop 13 away.

As far as the rest of us picking up the tab, that depends on how you look at it. If you have a runaway government that wants to increase spending to pay for all its programs, then I guess everyone has to pony up and pay more. That would include those damned old people who are breathing our air and taking up space. Retired folks probably have the crazy viewpoint that they worked hard all their lives and just want to spend the rest of their days living in the same home they always have without being told that they aren't doing enough for the rest of society.

All your other points are spot on. I'm glad people love it here. I want one of them to pay me top dollar for my house when I move out of state.