Letters: Deflating another housing bubble

Re “Home prices surge, sales plunge,” April 16

The remedy to working people being priced out of the housing market is to reform property taxes to protect residential property and, especially, homes owned by those who actually live in them.

First, tax residential property occupied as primary residences by homeowners or renters at a lower rate than other commercial property or secondary residences.

Second, make all property taxes significantly progressive and indexed to inflation to provide affordability incentives favoring modest, middle-class residences owned by those who live in them, or to small-time investors in modest commercial properties.

Properties purchased for large-scale commercial or investment purposes should be taxed at a significantly higher rate. Split-roll taxes and progressive rates would allow adequate property tax revenues without further squeezing the already burdened middle class.

Douglas Dunn

Escondido

According to the chief economist for the California Assn. of Realtors, “We haven’t seen this issue since 2007” — referring to the rapid increase in home prices.

And what happened in 2008? The financial meltdown and the bailout of banks “too big to fail” and of AIG, to the tune of more than $700 billion, backed by ordinary, middle-class taxpayers.

And the plutocrats who brought on the collapse? They were allowed to run back to their homes in the Hamptons with their obscene bonuses.

Now, middle-class home buyers, having been made to cover for the irresponsible, immoral, quasi-fraudulent maneuverings of Wall Street bigwigs, are the ones being punished by not being able to obtain mortgages or afford decent housing.

Where is the economic justice in any of that?

Robert McEwen

Cypress

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