Hello Taxman! Toronto raising property tax by 10-16% | Page 3 | GTAMotorcycle.com

Hello Taxman! Toronto raising property tax by 10-16%

nobbie48 said:
They'll roll it back to 15% and brag about how hard they worked to get it down.

It would be interesting to ask the long term councillors plus Chow what they were doing in years past when this monster was shedding its skin. Judas goats.

This reminds me of the "Don't pay for 2 years" furniture scam where it isn't hammered into people's heads you will pay double down the road.
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As a start, tie municipal profit to raises of elected officials. If there is no money left at the end of the year (or a deficit), raises are zero. Fix your financial house if you want to do better personally.
 
LePhillou said:
No matter how much we pay in taxes, sadly they don't cover more than 1/3rd of the costs in the budget usually when you look at different budgets
So without other subsidies from prov and fed govt that come also through things like gas tax, income tax, sales tax, etc the municipalities would just fall apart. Now add on that undertaxing at the municipal level for a city that has tons of service and tons of infrastructure to cover and you end up in the current situation.

We had a similar situation with our condo corp, 40 y old build, with an underground garage, they kept the condo fees ultra low for YEARS. My wife
joined the board and realized that we need to get the underground garage fixed, it was a 6 million ish project, reserve fund wasnt funded enough. They had to do increases, our condo fees have basically doubled in the time ive lived here. But until new blood was on the board, no one was willing to approve these increases. Had they done way smaller increases back in the day, we wouldnt be here but we waited until something was due to do it so we all "suffer"
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Move that to today.

Owner one bought ages ago, paid that down, has equity and a modest mortgage as his income has benefited from inflation.

Owner two bought a resale at or near peak and may only have one nostril above water with equity / mortgage. Employment income is subject to recession fears. In a few years his mortgage renews at a higher rate.

A study says the garage needs a $3 M rebuild for the 300 units. Owner two needs to pony up $10,000 and the bank won't touch him. He takes a bath trying to sell in a building with work orders against it and no funds to pay.
 
GreyGhost said:
10.5 assumes JT throws hundreds of millions at them. 16.5 assumes JT tells her to screw off and deal with it herself.
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What is JT prepared to pay for an uptick in popularity? I'll be OK without him but take the money and still kick him out.
 
nobbie48 said:
What is JT prepared to pay for an uptick in popularity? I'll be OK without him but take the money and still kick him out.
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He's retiring in 21 months and 9 days, don't know if he cares about Olivia.
 
Baggsy said:
Landlords don't have to worry too much, the increased can be passed directly to tenants.
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Iirc, increased property tax is one of the categories that can be easily passed to tenants. Not even sure if you need to go to ltb for that one. Now, I am sure some braindead or greedy landlord will go for a 10.5% rent bump to match the tax increase. Hopefully ltb kicks those idiots hard.
 
nobbie48 said:
Not too far off from my west Toronto abode, for now. A rider living in the big O said Orangeville kept taxes high to keep Toronto riffraff out. Port Dover I am told also has high taxes. I only compare lot size, house size and services when doing comparisons. Market value is of no consequence.

When you pay to park your car for the day the rate is the same for a Chevy and M-B.
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Someone's imagination is running wild. That's not the case.
 
Mad Mike said:
He's retiring in 21 months and 9 days, don't know if he cares about Olivia.
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Joly went with him on his Apology Tour yesterday, so it wasn't us with our pants around our ankles for a change.
 
GreyGhost said:
Iirc, increased property tax is one of the categories that can be easily passed to tenants. Not even sure if you need to go to ltb for that one. Now, I am sure some braindead or greedy landlord will go for a 10.5% rent bump to match the tax increase. Hopefully ltb kicks those idiots hard.
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Quoting:
People are struggling to put food on the table, pay their car bills or, in my case, attain the exponential growth that investors have come to expect from REITs no matter what, and this property tax hike isn’t going to help any of us with our equally relatable problems,”

It’s almost like they don’t want massive private investment from outside Canada controlling the market of the country’s largest city.

Does anyone think that a landlord in a foreign country gives a damn about us BMW driving, latte sippers when they don't care about the starving overworked masses in their own country?

Exponential growth, think about it and where we are on the curve.
 
A fairly up there civil servant (Handshake level with PM and cabinet) told me years ago that the government can't change a major policy having extreme effect on the population without giving the people time to adjust.

They blew that when they tried to change the age of retirement in one shot. A person born a day on the wrong side of the line had to work two more years. It could have worked if they tapered it in a month at a time over 24 years.

Similarly a 16% hit in one shot is brutal. Not everyone can handle the extra $75 to $100 a month especially with the real estate fiascoes, carbon taxes.

Give people a chance to learn how to cook instead of order off a menu, downsize their car, make their own coffees.

Of course it will hurt the restaurants as they struggle with supply prices.

How about the extra money the city made on transfer fees on the inflated home prices? Sorry, we spent it to pay off some of our 2007 credit card balance.

How about 8% for 2024 and lesser % amounts for 2025 and 2026. Put a hold on some of the Woke projects to bypass the deficit issue.
 
GreyGhost said:
As a start, tie municipal profit to raises of elected officials. If there is no money left at the end of the year (or a deficit), raises are zero. Fix your financial house if you want to do better personally.
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That's an easy easy. Tax hikes for everyone!
 
TK4 said:
Remember Mike Harris, Mel Lastman, Rob Ford ? They're the ones who put off the inevitable - municipal taxes have to go up at least for the rate of inflation and services provided. You pay your fair share to get what you deserve - if you don't the only answers are loss of services or a bigger debt. Economics 101.
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I don't think those guys deferred the inevitable, Toronto is just not that efficient. Every city has homeless, drug, and crime problems, most on a grander scale than Toronto. Every city has an infrastructure to manage, and facilities to maintain -- in theory if you can concentrate those you should be able to do things more efficiently.

Let's compare Markham and Toronto. Markham/York each collect and contribute to the cost of delivering services to the City of Markham. The combined cost was $4675/resident in 2023. Toronto, which is about 1/2 the area and 2.5x the population spends $5800 - that's a whopping 25% more per resident.

Do Torontonians get a whole lot more gov't services than the folks in Markham? Or does the Markham/York government act more responsibly when handling the public purse.

When Toronto procures a contractor for a construction project, the selected contractor must engage LiUNA members in the work. Approximately half of all City construction contracts are in the ICI sector, and the City tenders hundreds of million of dollars worth of contracts in this sector annually.

Example LiUNA starting wage:
WAGES VAC.PAY BENEFITS PENSION TOTALPKG.
Helper $ 31.41 $ 3.14 $ 5.77 $ 5.71 $ 46.03
Greaser $ 46.87 $ 4.68 $ 5.77 $ 8.12 $ 65.44
 
GreyGhost said:
An independent engineer has to review but there is a game that can be played. Something along the lines of they need to include items needing attention in the next 20 years or so. If yoibkark the chiller and parking garage down for 40 year life expectancy, they get mentioned in the report but not included in the costing. The first 20 years of life are free in that example.
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I was lucky as mine was an industrial condo and there were enough trades in the place to keep the report honest.

Residential is whole different animal. Cat fights over who was more important in the decision process etc.
 
How about the commercial tax rates?

WFH, downsizing, off-shoring are opening up office space. How will the added tax affect the market?

I don't know Toronto numbers but the carrying costs for my industrial unit were about 20% utilities and insurance. Taxes and maintenance fees were about 40% each. Adding 16% to 40% equals a 6.4% uptick in costs passed onto the tenants.

Do the tenants flee to lower tax zones in the burbs? Do their employees follow to get their white picket fence for a lot less?
 
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