Who wants a free house in Detroit?

[Meddle]

I just re-read.....

The $3K is for taxes and insurance on both house combined, so that's not really too far out of line.

[drjeff]

^^ My current taxes are about $300 on about 6 acres with a better house than you would find in Brightmoor.

Three grand is extremely high.

I have a nice house on a .2 acre lot in Washtenaw County. My taxes are nearly $5000/year. You obviously don't live in Michigan.

[DetroitPlanner]

A lot of folks are forgetting that Homestead property taxes are a lot less than non-Homestead taxes.

If these homes were owner-occupied the taxes would be considerably less.

[cub]

Did you see where REL said it was $3000 for taxes and insurance? It's not $3000 for the taxes.

[1KielsonDrive]

Not I. And not because I wouldn't want to live in Detroit. My last time around, about 2001, was just fine. I rented a room on the lower east side. I just would never want to deal with city hall and the DPD again during my lifetime. All they do is add insult to injury. Rub salt in your wounds.

[Hamtragedy]

And burning it is not an option. The insurance company will give you market value, and even if it's 5000, you have to tear it down, and they won't payout till the job is done, so you come up to $0.00. They will however give you money to rebuild, if that's in your policy, but you must do it at the same location.

Burning houses by the owner in this town does not pay, yet everyone thinks it does. So the house sits vacant, until the firebugs come by, or the homeless burning the trim in the fireplace.

[1KielsonDrive]

And burning it is not an option. The insurance company will give you market value, and even if it's 5000, you have to tear it down, and they won't payout till the job is done, so you come up to $0.00. They will however give you money to rebuild, if that's in your policy, but you must do it at the same location.

Burning houses by the owner in this town does not pay, yet everyone thinks it does. So the house sits vacant, until the firebugs come by, or the homeless burning the trim in the fireplace.

Good points Hamtragedy. Insurance companies usually give replacement value. I don't know exactly how to parse that one.

[Goose]

It would play hell with places like Detroit [[and just about any city with financial problems these days) but I would sure support a US constitutional amendment [[or law) which provided a "challenge" provision for property taxation. If a political entity assessed a value for ad valorem taxation, the owner could "challenge" it. If the entity refused to change the valuation, the property owner could demand the taxing authority to purchase the property at the valuation.

I absolutly LOVE this proposal, and I would go so far as to say that maybe they would have to purchase the property at 10% less than the valuation, as a error factor.

The problem arises where people don't maintain their properties. If you have a property that you don't put a new roof on the house or don't fix peeling interior paint, then its obviously worth less, but the assessing city doesn't take that into consideration, as they expect the owners to maintain the property to acceptable standards.