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Incentive Taxation Blog

NY

Saving your City: a Talk on Land Value Tax in Troy, NY


From the Collar City: You are Invited to a discussion on a new way to tax

Can your town use a new approach to in finance, planning and its relationships with citizens?



Property taxes are both the main source of revenue for local governments, and at the same time the most unpopular.  Economically, property taxes as they are currently structured, reward blight and disinvestment, while discouraging real estate markets from operating in more urbanized areas.  One tool used by dozens of cities in the US in hundreds of cities elsewhere is the land value tax is the land value tax.

Assessment Appeals: A Steady Drip as the values fall and equity suffers

All over the USA, property tax appeals are increasing dramatically.  Why and what does it mean?  

With the real estate bubble having burst and no end in sight, local and county governments along with school districts are facing a slow steady decline in assessment values not through the normal process of re-evaluation, but by an army of do-it-yourself and private firms that appeal real estate assessments.

Ironically, local governments dig in their heels at the thought of a revaluation, 

A Smarter Tax for Albany, NY

Albany New York for LVT studyAs the city of Albany wrings its hands over its problem of housing deterioration, especially in areas of student rentals, the obvious solution is pushed aside.
 
Economic incentives drive real estate choices in these areas, just as for other urban configurations.
 
Experience shows that shifting the property tax off improvements onto land values removes the penalties for development and maintenance, and spurs the improvement of underused locations.