6 ms·

I live in Spain (Valencia) and see lots of okupas around the city. In reality they occupy buildings that aren't being occupied. Property taxes are incredibly lo

I live in Spain (Valencia) and see lots of okupas around the city. In reality they occupy buildings that aren't being occupied. Property taxes are incredibly low here and many people who own empty buildings are fine with letting them sit, fall apart, and eat the property tax than do anything with them. These are the buildings that are prone to Okupas. I've never seen nor heard of it happening to actively used buildings. That said, I do think there are better solutions to allowing this to happen. It's a complicated issue here as housing is definitely viewed more as a right than in the USA, and honestly I'm really glad that the streets aren't full of homeless camps like they were when I lived in Oakland and SF.

panarky 2y ago
What's madness is the state allowing property owners to leave vacant, dilapidated buildings to blight the neighborhood. Owners should be required to maintain their structures and keep them occupied, or forfeit the property.
- abduhl 2y ago
  The government should tell property owners that they are required to keep their property occupied otherwise the government should seize their property? This is an extremist view. Who defines what “maintained” means? Beyond safety concerns about the structure (and even then, they shouldn’t be able to tell me anything as long as I post a danger unsafe structure keep out sign and lock the doors), why would the government have any right to tell me what to do with my building?
  - asoneth 2y ago
    > tell property owners that they are required to keep their property occupied otherwise the government should seize their property? I suspect it would make more sense to do so via tax policy, i.e. high property taxes (or LVT) with a deduction for each occupant. > why would the government have any right to tell me what to do with my building? For one thing, governments have a vested interest in not being overthrown. If a sufficiently large percentage of the population believes that their living standards are declining (including not having a place to live) then an increasing number of people will arrive at the conclusion that revolution or terrorism has a positive risk/reward ratio. I've worked in a country where the previous government had allowed this to occur; apparently it happened gradually and then suddenly. Beyond a certain point you can only consider something "my building" if you have the means to defend it against anyone who might wish to make it their building. In that case, the possession of a piece of paper which you once used to outsource the enforcement of your property rights to the previous government isn't very useful. (Edit: To be clear, I think allowing squatting is a poor solution to the problem of reducing homelessness and better tax and housing policies are more sustainable and equitable, I'm just explaining why the government has a substantial interest in what private landowners do with their properties.)
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    - abduhl 2y ago
      >> I suspect it would make more sense to do so via tax policy, i.e. high property taxes (or LVT) with a deduction for each occupant. Vacant land use taxes do make sense to me. That is not what GP advocated for: “Owners should be required to maintain their structures and keep them occupied, or forfeit the property.” Increased taxation is not forfeiture, and being forced to sell because taxes are prohibitive is different from the government taking your building. >> governments have a vested interest in not being overthrown This is a tortuous chain of logic to go from unoccupied buildings to overthrown government concerns.
      - asoneth 2y ago
        > That is not what GP advocated for Right, that's why before I responded to your question ("why would the government have any right to tell me what to do with my building?") I tried to make it clear that I think there are better approaches than what the GP was advocating for i.e. directly seizing vacant properties. > This is a tortuous chain of logic to get from building with squatters to government overthrown. Can you be more specific about what part you disagree with? To be clear, I'm not arguing that squatting results in overthrown governments, but that the acceptance of widespread squatting is sometimes a (shortsighted) policy response to a housing crisis. Squatting is a symptom but what can actually topple governments is sufficiently high levels of homelessness. Any government that allows a sufficiently large percentage of residents (especially young people) to become homeless will eventually be replaced by anarchy or a new government. To reiterate, I'm just trying to answer your question of what right the government has to tell you what to do with your property -- I'm not specifically defending the GP's suggestion.
      - tivert 2y ago
        > Increased taxation is not forfeiture, and being forced to sell because taxes are prohibitive is different from the government taking your building. That's a distinction without a difference, at least not a difference in the area we're talking about. Both mechanisms cause title to be lost if certain obligations are not met (in one case, an obligation to occupy, in the other, an obligation to pay taxes).
  - skitout 2y ago
    Even if I am the owner of an apartment, I don't have the right to do a metal concert in my living room some Saturdays at 1 am... or don't have the right to paint my frontage the way I want... cause it creates negative consequences for other people. Having vacant apartments and houses for long time in places where there is an housing shortage create much bigger negative consequences than few metal concerts...
    - abduhl 2y ago
      You do have a right to do a metal concert in your living room on Saturday at 1AM. You don’t have a right to violate the local noise ordinance or, because your example has you as an apartment owner and not a building owner, the condo association rules. You do have the right to paint your frontage the way you want with respect to the GOVERNMENT. But more importantly, the GP wanted the government to TAKE VIA FORFEITURE any building that is merely vacant. Your examples are limits on use, not relinquishment of property. They are not the same.
      - vidarh 2y ago
        There isn't a government on the planet which doesn't place limits on how you can paint your property. Try painting a death threat against a government official on it for example. The notion that property rights is unlimited is an extremist view that doesn't match the legal situation in any jurisdiction on the planet with a government.
  - tivert 2y ago
    >> What's madness is the state allowing property owners to leave vacant, dilapidated buildings to blight the neighborhood. Owners should be required to maintain their structures and keep them occupied, or forfeit the property. > The government should tell property owners that they are required to keep their property occupied otherwise the government should seize their property? This is an extremist view. It is not an extremist view. It's a public policy failure for land to sit vacant like that. Squatters rights can be a solution to that (e.g. in the US, squatters can actually get title to the land in cases of long-term abandonment). > Who defines what “maintained” means? Beyond safety concerns about the structure (and even then, they shouldn’t be able to tell me anything as long as I post a danger unsafe structure keep out sign and lock the doors), why would the government have any right to tell me what to do with my building? This is actually the extremist view, private property rights do not trump all other considerations. For a very clear example: if you're surrounded by starving people, and you own a warehouse full of food that you plan to let rot because you can't be bothered, the government absolutely does have the right to tell you what to do with that food.
    - abduhl 2y ago
      >> It's a public policy failure for land to sit vacant like that. Then the government should buy the land. >> For a very clear example: if you're surrounded by starving people, and you own a warehouse full of food that you plan to let rot because you can't be bothered, the government absolutely does have the right to tell you what to do with that food. Let’s not use other examples and argumentation by analogy when we already have a very clear fact pattern. You own a building and the building is not currently occupied. The building is unsightly but structurally sound. Does/should the government have the right to make you surrender that building without compensation (because that’s what forfeit means) simply due to it being unoccupied? Why?
      - tivert 2y ago
        >> It's a public policy failure for land to sit vacant like that. > Then the government should buy the land. No, I don't think so. > You own a building and the building is not currently occupied. The building is unsightly but structurally sound. Does/should the government have the right to make you surrender that building without compensation (because that’s what forfeit means) simply due to it being unoccupied? Why? Yes. The legal principle has a long, long history across many different legal systems. And I think you're thinking about it wrong: the government didn't "make you surrender that building," you chose to surrender it by leaving it unoccupied and unused to the point someone else could occupy and use it without a timely challenge.
  - TulliusCicero 2y ago
    > The government should tell property owners that they are required to keep their property occupied otherwise the government should seize their property? No, but they have to keep it in good condition, which includes keeping it secure.
  - vidarh 2y ago
    Land is a scarce resource, and society agrees to enforce artificial restrictions on access and use because in many instances it is beneficial, but that does not mean society should automatically be required to extend unlimited support for property claims when an owner behaves in ways detrimental to society as a whole. No jurisdiction on earth grants property rights without limitations.
- ekianjo 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - gryfft 2y ago
    In a manner of speaking... yes[0][1]. 0. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_and_Drug_Administration https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_and_Drug_Administration 1. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indecent_exposure_in_the_United_States https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indecent_exposure_in_the_Uni...
  - KaiserPro 2y ago
    parts of the USA have much much higher property tax than elsewhere.
  - Malcolmlisk 2y ago
    The government literally tells you what to eat and wear. And thank god... since without those laws we would eat the worst and toxic foods and wear toxic and low quality clothes.
    - 4ggr0 2y ago
      > wear toxic and low quality clothes uhm...that might be a bad example. winks towards shein, temu, fast fashion in general and thinking for a bit longer - corn syrup/sugar in general is not toxic but it certainly is not that healthy either, and it's got big lobbies and large amounts of money behind it to influence the government.
      - darkwater 2y ago
        Consider the worst case scenario and that, without regulations, it would be EVEN worse.
        4ggr0 2y ago
- lukan 2y ago
  In germany, if you see such a abandoned property, you cannot even ask the authority who owns it, if you have the plans to buy it (you would have to rely on local people knowing and telling you). There are quite some neglected properties around here and the owners are away, do not care anymore and the authorities do not care as long as the low property taxes are paid. There was a case close by, where a buisness wanted to get rid of the old rotting building next to them, but could not. It went on for years. Only after the building burned down (no idea if someone helped with that), the space could be finally cleared. So yeah, exproptiation should only ever be the last resort, but in some cases it really makes sense.
  - terminalcommand 2y ago
    The solution is actually simpler, set a property tax that would hurt if the buildings became vacant. For example if you pay 1% of the buildings value as property tax each year, it would make enough incentive to rent it out or sell if you don't need it. The proceeds can be used for building public housing projects or helping the homeless. Property tax was invented for this very reason.
    - lukan 2y ago
      Something like this yes. But the devil will be in the details. "pay 1% of the buildings value as property tax each year" A old rotten building might be worth just 10000€. And 100 € a year ain't that much. One would have to tax the property - and who will set up the rates in a fair way in a process that is not vulnerable to corruption?
      - amunozo 2y ago
        And old rotten building sitting anywhere in a city is worth way more than 10.000€. Even if the building is not in good shape, the land is still valuable.
        p_l 2y ago
        Many property tax systems are based around value of the building, not the land. I think Japan is one of the outliers where pretty much all property value is locked with the land itself, as buildings depreciate not appreciate.
stevenwoo 2y ago
Heck, some streets in industrial areas in Silicon Valley and the street my local Costco in Mountain View down Rengstorff across 101 from Google HQ are lined with people living in cars and vans and RVs.
salynchnew 2y ago
Ah, so the real problem here is for people who are "squatting" on an a large number of empty investment properties and don't want the hassle of dealing with any actual tenants.

panarky 2y ago

What's madness is the state allowing property owners to leave vacant, dilapidated buildings to blight the neighborhood. Owners should be required to maintain their structures and keep them occupied, or forfeit the property.

abduhl 2y ago
The government should tell property owners that they are required to keep their property occupied otherwise the government should seize their property? This is an extremist view. Who defines what “maintained” means? Beyond safety concerns about the structure (and even then, they shouldn’t be able to tell me anything as long as I post a danger unsafe structure keep out sign and lock the doors), why would the government have any right to tell me what to do with my building?
- asoneth 2y ago
  > tell property owners that they are required to keep their property occupied otherwise the government should seize their property? I suspect it would make more sense to do so via tax policy, i.e. high property taxes (or LVT) with a deduction for each occupant. > why would the government have any right to tell me what to do with my building? For one thing, governments have a vested interest in not being overthrown. If a sufficiently large percentage of the population believes that their living standards are declining (including not having a place to live) then an increasing number of people will arrive at the conclusion that revolution or terrorism has a positive risk/reward ratio. I've worked in a country where the previous government had allowed this to occur; apparently it happened gradually and then suddenly. Beyond a certain point you can only consider something "my building" if you have the means to defend it against anyone who might wish to make it their building. In that case, the possession of a piece of paper which you once used to outsource the enforcement of your property rights to the previous government isn't very useful. (Edit: To be clear, I think allowing squatting is a poor solution to the problem of reducing homelessness and better tax and housing policies are more sustainable and equitable, I'm just explaining why the government has a substantial interest in what private landowners do with their properties.)
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - abduhl 2y ago
    >> I suspect it would make more sense to do so via tax policy, i.e. high property taxes (or LVT) with a deduction for each occupant. Vacant land use taxes do make sense to me. That is not what GP advocated for: “Owners should be required to maintain their structures and keep them occupied, or forfeit the property.” Increased taxation is not forfeiture, and being forced to sell because taxes are prohibitive is different from the government taking your building. >> governments have a vested interest in not being overthrown This is a tortuous chain of logic to go from unoccupied buildings to overthrown government concerns.
    - asoneth 2y ago
      > That is not what GP advocated for Right, that's why before I responded to your question ("why would the government have any right to tell me what to do with my building?") I tried to make it clear that I think there are better approaches than what the GP was advocating for i.e. directly seizing vacant properties. > This is a tortuous chain of logic to get from building with squatters to government overthrown. Can you be more specific about what part you disagree with? To be clear, I'm not arguing that squatting results in overthrown governments, but that the acceptance of widespread squatting is sometimes a (shortsighted) policy response to a housing crisis. Squatting is a symptom but what can actually topple governments is sufficiently high levels of homelessness. Any government that allows a sufficiently large percentage of residents (especially young people) to become homeless will eventually be replaced by anarchy or a new government. To reiterate, I'm just trying to answer your question of what right the government has to tell you what to do with your property -- I'm not specifically defending the GP's suggestion.
    - tivert 2y ago
      > Increased taxation is not forfeiture, and being forced to sell because taxes are prohibitive is different from the government taking your building. That's a distinction without a difference, at least not a difference in the area we're talking about. Both mechanisms cause title to be lost if certain obligations are not met (in one case, an obligation to occupy, in the other, an obligation to pay taxes).
- skitout 2y ago
  Even if I am the owner of an apartment, I don't have the right to do a metal concert in my living room some Saturdays at 1 am... or don't have the right to paint my frontage the way I want... cause it creates negative consequences for other people. Having vacant apartments and houses for long time in places where there is an housing shortage create much bigger negative consequences than few metal concerts...
  - abduhl 2y ago
    You do have a right to do a metal concert in your living room on Saturday at 1AM. You don’t have a right to violate the local noise ordinance or, because your example has you as an apartment owner and not a building owner, the condo association rules. You do have the right to paint your frontage the way you want with respect to the GOVERNMENT. But more importantly, the GP wanted the government to TAKE VIA FORFEITURE any building that is merely vacant. Your examples are limits on use, not relinquishment of property. They are not the same.
    - vidarh 2y ago
      There isn't a government on the planet which doesn't place limits on how you can paint your property. Try painting a death threat against a government official on it for example. The notion that property rights is unlimited is an extremist view that doesn't match the legal situation in any jurisdiction on the planet with a government.
- tivert 2y ago
  >> What's madness is the state allowing property owners to leave vacant, dilapidated buildings to blight the neighborhood. Owners should be required to maintain their structures and keep them occupied, or forfeit the property. > The government should tell property owners that they are required to keep their property occupied otherwise the government should seize their property? This is an extremist view. It is not an extremist view. It's a public policy failure for land to sit vacant like that. Squatters rights can be a solution to that (e.g. in the US, squatters can actually get title to the land in cases of long-term abandonment). > Who defines what “maintained” means? Beyond safety concerns about the structure (and even then, they shouldn’t be able to tell me anything as long as I post a danger unsafe structure keep out sign and lock the doors), why would the government have any right to tell me what to do with my building? This is actually the extremist view, private property rights do not trump all other considerations. For a very clear example: if you're surrounded by starving people, and you own a warehouse full of food that you plan to let rot because you can't be bothered, the government absolutely does have the right to tell you what to do with that food.
  - abduhl 2y ago
    >> It's a public policy failure for land to sit vacant like that. Then the government should buy the land. >> For a very clear example: if you're surrounded by starving people, and you own a warehouse full of food that you plan to let rot because you can't be bothered, the government absolutely does have the right to tell you what to do with that food. Let’s not use other examples and argumentation by analogy when we already have a very clear fact pattern. You own a building and the building is not currently occupied. The building is unsightly but structurally sound. Does/should the government have the right to make you surrender that building without compensation (because that’s what forfeit means) simply due to it being unoccupied? Why?
    - tivert 2y ago
      >> It's a public policy failure for land to sit vacant like that. > Then the government should buy the land. No, I don't think so. > You own a building and the building is not currently occupied. The building is unsightly but structurally sound. Does/should the government have the right to make you surrender that building without compensation (because that’s what forfeit means) simply due to it being unoccupied? Why? Yes. The legal principle has a long, long history across many different legal systems. And I think you're thinking about it wrong: the government didn't "make you surrender that building," you chose to surrender it by leaving it unoccupied and unused to the point someone else could occupy and use it without a timely challenge.
- TulliusCicero 2y ago
  > The government should tell property owners that they are required to keep their property occupied otherwise the government should seize their property? No, but they have to keep it in good condition, which includes keeping it secure.
- vidarh 2y ago
  Land is a scarce resource, and society agrees to enforce artificial restrictions on access and use because in many instances it is beneficial, but that does not mean society should automatically be required to extend unlimited support for property claims when an owner behaves in ways detrimental to society as a whole. No jurisdiction on earth grants property rights without limitations.
ekianjo 2y ago
[flagged]
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- gryfft 2y ago
  In a manner of speaking... yes[0][1]. 0. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_and_Drug_Administration https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_and_Drug_Administration 1. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indecent_exposure_in_the_United_States https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indecent_exposure_in_the_Uni...
- KaiserPro 2y ago
  parts of the USA have much much higher property tax than elsewhere.
- Malcolmlisk 2y ago
  The government literally tells you what to eat and wear. And thank god... since without those laws we would eat the worst and toxic foods and wear toxic and low quality clothes.
  - 4ggr0 2y ago
    > wear toxic and low quality clothes uhm...that might be a bad example. winks towards shein, temu, fast fashion in general and thinking for a bit longer - corn syrup/sugar in general is not toxic but it certainly is not that healthy either, and it's got big lobbies and large amounts of money behind it to influence the government.
    - darkwater 2y ago
      Consider the worst case scenario and that, without regulations, it would be EVEN worse.
      - 4ggr0 2y ago
lukan 2y ago
In germany, if you see such a abandoned property, you cannot even ask the authority who owns it, if you have the plans to buy it (you would have to rely on local people knowing and telling you). There are quite some neglected properties around here and the owners are away, do not care anymore and the authorities do not care as long as the low property taxes are paid. There was a case close by, where a buisness wanted to get rid of the old rotting building next to them, but could not. It went on for years. Only after the building burned down (no idea if someone helped with that), the space could be finally cleared. So yeah, exproptiation should only ever be the last resort, but in some cases it really makes sense.
- terminalcommand 2y ago
  The solution is actually simpler, set a property tax that would hurt if the buildings became vacant. For example if you pay 1% of the buildings value as property tax each year, it would make enough incentive to rent it out or sell if you don't need it. The proceeds can be used for building public housing projects or helping the homeless. Property tax was invented for this very reason.
  - lukan 2y ago
    Something like this yes. But the devil will be in the details. "pay 1% of the buildings value as property tax each year" A old rotten building might be worth just 10000€. And 100 € a year ain't that much. One would have to tax the property - and who will set up the rates in a fair way in a process that is not vulnerable to corruption?
    - amunozo 2y ago
      And old rotten building sitting anywhere in a city is worth way more than 10.000€. Even if the building is not in good shape, the land is still valuable.
      - p_l 2y ago
        Many property tax systems are based around value of the building, not the land. I think Japan is one of the outliers where pretty much all property value is locked with the land itself, as buildings depreciate not appreciate.

stevenwoo 2y ago

Heck, some streets in industrial areas in Silicon Valley and the street my local Costco in Mountain View down Rengstorff across 101 from Google HQ are lined with people living in cars and vans and RVs.

salynchnew 2y ago

Ah, so the real problem here is for people who are "squatting" on an a large number of empty investment properties and don't want the hassle of dealing with any actual tenants.