Pay your property taxes Apple!

[Airbozo]

OK, I am still looking for any "official" information, but here is the story:

Apple has not paid their property taxes in a long time because they are disputing the value of their property. Fine. Real estate has taken a nose dive, but their property is still worth MILLIONS! They refuse to pay until the county appraises their property at the value Apple wants which is significantly lower than the market value according to the county. To garner support for its position, Apple has been contacting all of the businesses around them (power in numbers), and basically getting them to not pay until they get a property appraisal that they (the companies) deem is fair to them.

Some of you may be familiar with where Apple is located and it is one of the most prime pieces of real estate in the south bay and possibly Silicon Valley. Read: VERY EXPENSIVE!

OK, why should I care?

The wife works at a school located in the county where Apple is and the property taxes they are supposed to pay helps fund the school system (one of the better ones in the bay area too). The SO was told yesterday that her district is going to have to lay off 500 teachers because the funding is not there due to Apple and several other companies refusing to pay taxes.

WTF! Apple? You make Billions of dollars and cannot pay a few million in taxes?!?!

NEVER will I buy any of your products. Pay up slouchers!

OK, thanks for reading my rant.
If anyone can find the story, let me know or post a link. I will post it if I find it too.

[mDust]

It's been my experience that the more money someone has the harder they try getting out of paying their bills or at least paying in full. Greed was a huge motivator in obtaining their fortune and it's just as huge a motivator when it comes to trying to hold on to every last penny. I guess it applies to corporations as well... This is shameful but not surprising. At least there are exceptions to the rule...like Bill Gates. And I'm not even trying to make an Apple-Microsoft parallel, that's just a coincidence.

[jdbnsn]

It is the best of times, it is the worst of times....


I'd bet the local state officials who aren't kicking down the door of Apple's HQ like they would your home if you hadn't paid use lots of Apple products, including limousines, sports cars, and condos in the French Riviera. Say the word, I'm ready for a revolution!

[msmrx57]

It is the best of times, it is the worst of times....


I'd bet the local state officials who aren't kicking down the door of Apple's HQ like they would your home if you hadn't paid use lots of Apple products, including limousines, sports cars, and condos in the French Riviera. Say the word, I'm ready for a revolution!

Don't even get me started on a revolution. I live in Fitzwalkerstan (the state formerly known as Wisconsin). :no:

Edit: Yes very definitely the more they have the harder and dirtier they fight to keep it and take/get more.

[OvRiDe]

I found this article from last August. It talks about how much property tax they contribute, but nothing about them not paying.

http://www.ncoc.net/index.php?tray=content&tid=top42&cid=103C49

[crenn]

Another reason why I shouldn't like Apple ;P

EDIT: I wonder if the reason it hasn't gotten out is the Laywers are flexing their pens again, threating to sue if anyone speaks about it. If this is the case... I'm sure TBCS will get a letter from Apple demanding this thread be removed.

[Airbozo]

Don't even get me started on a revolution. I live in Fitzwalkerstan (the state formerly known as Wisconsin). :no:

Edit: Yes very definitely the more they have the harder and dirtier they fight to keep it and take/get more.

Man, don;t get me started on this one either (I might get banned and take several of you with me... LOL!).

I wrote an email to the local newspaper to see if they could find out any more info on the Apple tax issue.

[altec]

Have the teachers considered action themselves? Something along the lines of a strike? Seems like a good starting point. A teacher strike caused by Apple? That is juicy enough the media would cream their pants. After that it shouldn't take long for SOMETHING to happen.

[x88x]

They refuse to pay until the county appraises their property at the value Apple wants

Ahem... Hey Apple...I got news for you. YOU DON'T GET A SAY IN WHAT THE TAX APPRAISER SAYS YOUR PROPERTY IS WORTH! PAY YOUR DAMN TAXES!

[diluzio91]

Ahem... Hey Apple...I got news for you. YOU DON'T GET A SAY IN WHAT THE TAX APPRAISER SAYS YOUR PROPERTY IS WORTH! PAY YOUR DAMN TAXES!


aah. you forget, they live in appleopolis , not the united states.
and as such, their form of currency is "Magic" which isn't accepted as an acceptable payment form in the US.

[TheGreatSatan]

The SO was told yesterday that her district is going to have to lay off 500 teachers because the funding is not there due to Apple and several other companies refusing to pay taxes.

Not in a union?

[knowledgegranted]

You guys are missing a MAJOR point here. I'm not defending Apple in his comment, rather I'm speaking for everyone.


Your property is your investment. Apple's property is likewise one of their investments. I would also like to add that no appraisal attempt has been made at all. If the county did not pay someone to come and appraise my property, how and more importantly WHY would I pay taxes? Not only would I not know the amount I would need to pay, I also wouldn't want to pay them because my investment was not properly appraised. Basically, you want my money, then appraise my property.

I would like to add that many Silicon Valley companies fall into this loop, and not just Apple. Also, many silicon valley companies' properties are actually way over appraised. Someone said they make Billions, well they may make alot, but to be honest their profit only goes back into the next batch of product. Meaning, it pays for the parts of the next series.

Before anyone goes off and says I'm an Apple fanboy, @$$, yada...yada read this.

The only Apple product I own is a Macbook, provided by my school. I have an android phone, homebrew computer, Motorola Zoom tablet. I'm far from Apple.

[Mach]

I'd be interested in what your local newspaper finds. If they've been able to bury a story like this, they are more powerful in CA than I believed. I'd expect a story that involves Apple being the evil doer would light up the blogs. I can find no mention.

I did find this story that paints a fairly grim picture of Santa Clara County's property tax revenue outlook.
http://www.tax.com/taxcom/taxblog.nsf/Permalink/UBEN-8932YU?OpenDocument

I also found this one where Apple talks to the board of Cuppertino. http://www.marketwatch.com/story/apples-buy-of-big-h-p-campus-shows-shift-2010-11-30

When Jobs gave his update to the city council, he said Apple had amassed a total of nine properties — buying some from H-P — across Pruneridge Avenue from the much larger H-P site. Jobs said Apple hoped to build an approximately 50-acre campus, for about 3,000 to 3,500 employees, in addition to its existing headquarters at One Infinite Loop.

“I think we found a way to stay in Cupertino, and, since we are your largest taxpayer, I thought you might be happy about that,” Jobs said. “And we’ll probably get larger still.”

[x88x]

Your property is your investment. Apple's property is likewise one of their investments. I would also like to add that no appraisal attempt has been made at all. If the county did not pay someone to come and appraise my property, how and more importantly WHY would I pay taxes? Not only would I not know the amount I would need to pay, I also wouldn't want to pay them because my investment was not properly appraised. Basically, you want my money, then appraise my property.
This is a fair point, in a way, but I think a bit misinformed, for a few reasons (which, to be fair, I only know because I recently purchased property myself).

Tax assessments don't affect the actual value of the property, it's the other way around. A tax assessment reflects the market value of the property, the market value is not affected at all by the tax assessment.
I don't know 100% what the case is in CA, but in MD, property tax assessments are conducted every 3 years. You can appeal your tax assessment any time during that three year period, but the state has no legal obligation to conduct another assessment until that 3 year period is up.
The property owner does have a legal obligation to pay their property taxes. Either at closing or when the last tax assessment was conducted, they signed a binding legal contract in which they stated that they would pay $[x] in property taxes for years [y], [x], and [q]. Again, I do not know 100% that this is the case in CA, but I assume it is...otherwise nobody would pay their property taxes.
Apple is saying that their property value is much lower than the market value, which flies in the face of the "it's an investment" argument (I'm not saying real estate is not an investment, just that this is not an explanation for Apple's behavior). The only thing that changes if a tax assessment changes is the amount of property taxes that the owner pays...thus, why Apple is saying their property is worth so much less.

BTW, a side note on the eccentricities of property law; an assessment and an appraisal are very different things that have basically nothing to do with each other. An assessment is done by the State to estimate the current market value of the property, on which to base the property taxes charged to the owner of that property. An appraisal is done by an independent party to determine the current market value of the property to ensure that the sale price is not significantly greater than the market value. This is primarily to protect the lender from the buyer later defaulting on the mortgage because the property is worth much less than the mortgage. As an example of the disconnect between these three values (tax assessment, appraisal, and market value), when I bought my house, the difference between the purchase price (by definition the market value, at that moment in time), which was the lowest value, and the then-current tax assessement, which was the highest value, was $189,770. A value greater than the purchase price! Even now that it has been reassessed and the assessed value has dropped almost $150,000 the difference is still ~$40,000 which, if you've been doing the math, is a decent sized chunk of the market value.

Mach, while I admit those are seemingly troubling numbers for the counties in question, and I'm sure they will cause many financial problems, I would be curious to see the numbers for those counties over the last 10 years. If you look at property values over the last 10 years or so, over most of the country they rose to record highs around 2007 (and, therefore, record high property tax revenue), and have been on a fairly steady decline ever since. It stands to reason that tax revenues will then also fall. But, if you look at the long picture, I know in my area at least, property values on average are still higher than they were in 2004 (and, therefore, tax revenue is higher than it was in 2004).


“I think we found a way to stay in Cupertino, and, since we are your largest taxpayer, I thought you might be happy about that,” Jobs said. “And we’ll probably get larger still.”
I can't speak for the city of Cupertino, but if it were me, I would rather have taxpayers who actually paid their taxes, regardless of who they are or how much property they own.

[FuzzyPlushroom]

aah. you forget, they live in appleopolis , not the united states.
and as such, their form of currency is "Magic" which isn't accepted as an acceptable payment form in the US.

I've got a few hundred spare magic, and I wouldn't mind an iPod...

[knowledgegranted]

This is a fair point, in a way, but I think a bit misinformed, for a few reasons (which, to be fair, I only know because I recently purchased property myself).

I can't speak for the city of Cupertino, but if it were me, I would rather have taxpayers who actually paid their taxes, regardless of who they are or how much property they own.




You are absolutely correct, this is my mistake on the misinformed info. I work for an international company and sometimes I get all of my info wrong. But thank you for correcting me.


Here's my conclusion, it isn't quite right, but I think you guys are ranting just because it's a large corporation. People do this type of stuff 24/7/365, they scam IRS, insurance companies, doctor's offices, you think of it they've done it. I come from an area that's not too great, and I swear there is a tax evaded business at least every week.

[x88x]

Here's my conclusion, it isn't quite right, but I think you guys are ranting just because it's a large corporation. People do this type of stuff 24/7/365, they scam IRS, insurance companies, doctor's offices, you think of it they've done it. I come from an area that's not too great, and I swear there is a tax evaded business at least every week.

Nah, I'd be ranting if it were some normal person doing it too...just that regular people evading their taxes doesn't make news. ;)