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The state Assembly and Senate passed the usual flurry of bills on May 31, the last day for initial-house approval, with some unusual drama that temporarily sidelined a medical-marijuana bill by Assemblymember Tom Ammiano.

By the time it was all over, several other Ammiano bills passed, a measure by Assemblymember Phil Ting to ease the way for a Warriors arena on the waterfront won approval, and state Sen. Mark Leno got most of his major legislation through.

The pot bill, AB 473, would have established a state regulatory framework for medical cannabis, something that most advocates and providers support. Still, because the subject is marijuana, it was no easy sell — and at first, a lot of members, both Republicans and Democrats, expressed concern that the measure might restrict the ability of local government to ban or limit dispensaries.

Ammiano, in presenting the bill, made it clear that it had no impact on local control, and that was enough to get 38 votes. Typically, when a bill is that close to passage, the chair asks the sponsor if he or she wants to “hold the call” — that is, freeze the vote for a few minutes so supporters can make sure all of their allies are actually on the floor and voting and to try, if necessary, to round up a couple of wobblers.

In this case, though, Speaker Pro Tem Nora Campos, of San Jose, simply gaveled the vote to a close while Ammiano was scrambling to get her to hold it. “That’s very unusual, not good behavior,” one Sacramento insider told me.

Ammiano was more respectful toward Campos, simply calling it a “procedural mistake.” He told us he would be looking for other ways to move the bill. “The door is never fully closed up here,” he said.

However that turns out, the veteran Assemblymember, now in his final term, won a resounding victory with the passage of his Domestic Workers Bill of Rights, AB 241. The bill would give domestic workers some of the same labor rights as other employees, including the right to overtime pay and breaks. “These workers, who are mostly women, keep our households running smoothly, care for our children, and enable people with disabilities to live at home and remain engaged in our communities,” Ammiano said. “Why shouldn’t they have overtime protections like the average barista or gas station attendant?”

An Ammiano bill restricting the ability of prosecutors to use condom possession as evidence in prostitution cases also cleared, as did a bill tightening safety rules on firearms.

Ting’s bill, AB 1273, would allow the state Legislature, not the Bay Conservation and Development Commission, to make a key finding on whether the new area is appropriate for the shoreline. Mayor Ed Lee and the Warriors strongly backed the measure, clearly believing it would make the path to development easier. Ammiano voted against it — showing that the San Francisco delegation is by no means unanimous on this issue.

Leno had a string of significant victories. A bill called the Disclose Act, which would mandate that all campaign ads reveal, in large, readable type, who is actually paying for them, cleared with the precise two-thirds majority needed — and it was a straight party-line vote. Every single Republican was in opposition. “They know that if their ads say “paid for by Chevron and PGE, the won’t work as well,” Leno told us.

He also won approval for a bill that would ease the way for people wrongfully imprisoned for crimes they didn’t commit to receive the modest $100 a day payment the state theoretically owes them. There are 132 people cleared of crimes and released from prison, but the process of applying for the payment is currently so onerous that only 11 have actually gotten a penny. “We victimized these people, and we shouldn’t make them prove their innocence twice,” Leno said.

Bills to better monitor price manipulation by oil companies and to expand the trauma recovery program pioneered by San Francisco General Hospital also cleared the Senate floor.

But Leno had a disappointing loss, too: A bill that would have helped tenants collect on security deposits that landlords wrongfully withheld died with only 12 vote — a sign of how powerful the real-estate industry remains in Sacramento.

Article source: http://www.sfbg.com/politics/2013/06/03/some-wins-some-losses-sacto

Meanwhile, a separate report showed the number of underwater homes in the nine Bay Area counties slowly subsiding as values rise.

“It is starting to come back, there is no question,” Ting said. “San Francisco remains probably the strongest real estate market in the state.”

Throughout the housing downturn, San Francisco was a Teflon-coated county compared with the rest of California, with more moderate declines in real estate values than elsewhere. It was the only county in California that never saw its overall tax roll shrink during the downturn. For the 2012-13 tax year, the assessed values in San Francisco grew 4.17 percent, or $6 billion.

Commercial properties led the growth surge, particularly in emerging areas for biotech and technology firms: Mission Bay, the South of Market portion of the Financial District, and the Inner Mission.

“Even during this very challenging recession, we’re seeing (strength in) those markets driven by industries like life science, biotech and health care as well as tech companies,” Ting said.

Under Proposition 13, properties are reassessed by more than the annual 2 percent limit when they change hands, undergo significant renovation or are newly built. All three factors were at play in the surge in values in areas such as SoMa and Mission Bay.

Residential recovery

On the residential side, the recovery is more checkered, with weak areas particularly in the southeast and western parts of town.

Proposition 8, passed in 1978, lets assessments temporarily drop to match lower property values. Around the city, 15,811 properties got such reductions this year, averaging $175,980 in reduced value per home.

Ironically, Mission Bay, South Beach and South of Market – home to lots of new condos – were among the residential areas with the most Prop. 8 reductions, despite their boom on the commercial side.

“That whole cluster was heavily impacted and had the biggest overall declines in roll value,” Ting said. “They had a significant amount of new building, which created a bit of temporary oversupply.”

Lower-income areas, such as Bayview and Excelsior, continue to struggle.

“Those generally have been the softest real estate markets over the past couple of years,” Ting said. “They are entry points for the first-time home buyers. They were the first to show softness and the last to show strength.”

Meanwhile, perennially popular – and pricey – neighborhoods such as Pacific Heights, Noe Valley and Russian Hill saw assessed values rising.

“Areas that traditionally have been in high demand remain fairly strong,” Ting said.

Overall, Ting said, “I feel our recessionary recovery is U-shaped. We’ve definitely stabilized. It doesn’t feel like it’s jumping back in a sharp V shape the way it did in 2004 or 2005.”

Frothy market

Assessments look at property values as of Jan. 1, so this year’s exceptionally frothy real estate market is not yet factored in. But a report from real estate service Zillow showed that rising home values decreased the percentage of underwater properties between the first quarter and second quarter.

“It’s good news that negative equity is dropping, but we expect the overall recovery to be fairly slow,” said Stan Humphries, Zillow chief economist. “We are now mostly at bottom in most markets.”

Alameda and Contra Costa counties – two of the hardest-hit areas locally – saw significant changes in negative equity, which went from 33.8 percent of mortgaged homes in Alameda to 30.9, and from 42.8 percent in Contra Costa to 40.1.

“Besides a very healthy appreciation in home values, the high pace of foreclosure activity is also pushing negative equity down” in those counties, Humphries said.

That’s because once underwater homes are repossessed by banks and resold at lower prices, the new owners start out with equity through their down payments.

San Francisco stands out for having a relatively small pool of underwater homes.

“The big driver is that home values there are down just over 12 percent from their peak,” Humphries said. “That’s a very modest decline, which leads to a very low rate of negative equity.”

By comparison, Alameda values are down 37 percent from peak, Contra Costa almost 51 percent and Solano County almost 60 percent, he said.

Negative equity slowly subsides

The percentage of underwater homes, with mortgages larger than the value, decreased in every Bay Area county between the first and second quarters of this year.

Source: Zillow.com

Where home prices are rising

These neighborhoods saw the biggest increase in total assessments, which look at the values of all properties as of Jan. 1.

Source: San Francisco Assessor’s Office

Carolyn Said is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail: csaid@sfchronicle.com

Article source: http://www.sfgate.com/business/article/SF-property-values-rebounding-3814168.php

Still, area assessors pointed out that results were mixed. In some counties, most growth in assessments came from the annual 2 percent increase for inflation allowed under Proposition 13. In all counties, thousands of properties were worth less than their previous assessed value – the purchase price plus inflation – because 1978′s Proposition 8 lets the assessment temporarily drop to match the fallen property value.

“Remember, property values plummeted so low that we haven’t come close to making up the losses we’ve experienced,” said Jean Hurst, legislative representative for the California State Association of Counties. “This is no windfall by any means, but it’s a function of the stabilization and the gradual uptick that economists tell us the recovery will look like.”

San Francisco, Santa Clara and San Mateo counties had the biggest increases in the Bay Area, and among the biggest in the state.

“We are clearly on the way back up,” said San Francisco Assessor Phil Ting, noting that it is the only county in the state that never experienced a downturn in its property tax roll over the past few years. “We believe this is probably the last year that many homeowners will be getting a reduction (of assessed value) because the market is coming back.”

Silicon Valley growth

Both San Mateo and Santa Clara counties said they benefited from Silicon Valley firms’ expansion.

“The resurgence here is being led by business,” said Larry Stone, assessor for Santa Clara County, where the overall roll was up 3.25 percent. “The office market is on fire. As spaces lease up, they begin to build out the insides.”

Once businesses lease space and add staff, they buy equipment. That was apparent in both counties as the category of “business personal property,” which includes machinery, computers and fixtures, rose 6.48 percent in Santa Clara County and 5.45 percent in San Mateo.

Still, both counties had tens of thousands of homes that were assessed lower.

“It appears we’re gradually pulling out of the slump,” said Mark Church, assessor of San Mateo County, where the roll rose by 3.33 percent. “We’re moving in the right direction, but we’re not there yet.”

Property tax revenue is split among schools, counties, cities and special assessment districts. The plunge in real estate values resulted in an even tighter budget crunch for those entities.

This year, after three years of minimal or negative growth, Santa Clara County, with the biggest roll in the Bay Area – reflecting the value of Silicon Valley businesses and affluent residential communities – saw an extra $9.7 billion in assessed value. At a 1 percent tax rate, that translates to $97 million more in tax revenue.

But in Solano, the worst-performing Bay Area county, the roll was down by 3.12 percent or $1.22 billion, meaning $12.2 million less in tax revenue.

Wide disparities were evident even within a single county.

Take San Mateo, for instance. Atherton, where the cheapest house for sale is asking $1.595 million, saw assessed values rise more than 9 percent, but in East Palo Alto, where many home values hover around $300,000, the assessments were down 2 percent.

“We’re seeing sharp contrasts between the high-end locations and the entry-level locations,” Church said.

East Bay moderate

In East Bay counties, increases were more moderate.

Alameda County was up 2.14 percent, just a tad ahead of the inflationary increase. “It’s going to take a long time” to fully recover from the downturn, said Brian Hitomi, chief deputy assessor.

Contra Costa’s 0.86 percent growth was largely due to an appeals board decision that increased the value of Chevron’s Richmond refinery for 2007, 2008 and 2009. The tax bump for all three years is reflected in the 2012-13 roll.

“It’s a one-time thing,” said assessor Gus Kramer. “Anyone who hangs their hat on that economically going forward is a fool.”

Contra Costa’s real estate market is basically flat, he said.

“The market is bouncing on the bottom and trying to recover,” he said. “There are some areas that are pretty healthy,” such as the affluent communities of Danville, Lafayette, Moraga and Orinda.

Likewise, the North Bay was fairly stagnant, other than Solano County’s 3.12 percent decline. With towns like Vallejo ravaged by the foreclosure crisis, Solano reduced assessments for more than half of all properties. Since 2007, its roll has fallen by 17.16 percent or $7.849 billon.

Napa County saw a 2.06 percent rise, “mostly due to the inflationary increase,” said Steve Schellhamer, assistant assessor. “Although it’s positive, it would be premature at this point to declare that we’re out of the slump.”

Marin nearly flat

Marin County’s assessed roll nudged up just 0.82 percent.

“The good news is that we don’t see things going dramatically south anymore,” said Assessor Rich Benson. “I don’t think it’s time to say that the market has turned around yet, but we’re seeing some positive indicators.”

He and other assessors pointed out that home sales have been robust throughout the spring. Since assessments for the 2012-13 tax year look at values as of Jan. 1, 2012, those stronger sales aren’t yet factored in.

Sonoma County, which got an extension to close its roll in late July, expects it to be flat.

“I hope we’re close to the bottom,” said Bill Rousseau, chief deputy assessor.

Property tax assessments slowly rise

For the 2012-13 tax year, property tax rolls in most Bay Area counties edged up, even while thousands of homes still had assessments temporarily reduced because their values had declined. Assessments consider value as of Jan. 1, so the recent surge in the real estate market is not yet reflected.

{+1} In billions

{+2} Under Proposition 8, passed in 1978, properties are temporarily assessed lower when their market value falls below their previously assessed value – the purchase price plus an annual increase of 2% or the California Consumer Price Index, whichever is less. When the market rebounds, properties can be reassessed to this “factored base year value.”

{+3} Sonoma County numbers are estimates; roll will close in late July.

Source: County assessors

Carolyn Said is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail: csaid@sfchronicle.com

Article source: http://www.sfgate.com/business/article/Property-tax-assessments-gradually-bouncing-back-3690479.php

“We’re very, very fortunate in San Francisco,” Ting told SFAppeal. He also predicted that the growth will only continue here in SF in the coming years.

(SCROLL DOWN FOR PHOTOS)

This may be news for Bay Area buyers and sellers, but real estate agents aren’t surprised.

“This city is a gold mine for real estate,” Rick Teed, cofounder of real estate and development company Teed Haze, told HuffPost. “If you have a house with no view, but it’s redone and in a neighborhood like Pacific Heights, it’s going to be north of $1000-per-square foot for starters.”

Teed agrees with Ting’s prediction that the market will only continue to grow. “We are a seven-by-seven-square-mile city,” said Teed. “There is no new land.”

Daniel Cressman, executive vice president of the commercial real estate company Grubb El, also commented on our city’s limited space. He told NBC Bay Area that San Francisco is “one of the very few markets in the entire country where investment demand for commercial office space is far outstripping the available supply that’s for sale.”

To celebrate this news, we contacted Sotheby’s International Realty and got some pictures of a home they are especially excited about. Check out this unreal Gold Coast-style 1927 home designed by Willis Polk Co. in Pacific Heights. We would move in tomorrow if it weren’t for that $25 million price tag.

Take a look at images of this amazing home below:

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Article source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/07/22/san-francisco-real-estate-best-market-in-state_n_907245.html

The same appears to be true now in California when it comes to the ease of getting an accurate property tax assessment.

For the third consecutive fiscal year, the real estate market has faltered— unprecedented since property tax reform took effect with Proposition 13 in 1978 — calling into question the values of homes and businesses for tax purposes.

Assessors are required to come up with accurate values, but state law does not dictate how, and the process varies wildly by county: it can be simple, or a contentious ordeal.

“A lot of it is reflective of how the office operates,” Jon Coupal, president of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, which advocated for Proposition 13, said of the state’s assessors.

Three years in, the different approaches of some assessors are emerging as mirrors of their communities: friendly in the suburbs, high tech in Silicon Valley, and in San Francisco — a city where a protest of some sort occurs nearly every day — cantankerous.

“It was very adversarial,” said David Zisser, who appealed the assessment of his Japantown condominium.

Mr. Zisser, a lawyer who spoke animatedly with his paperwork strewn across a table in the downtown Olympic Club, bought his home in 2005, near the height of the market, for $604,000. But in 2009, even after the housing market had collapsed, the San Francisco Assessor-Recorder’s Office placed its value at $653,000.

Mr. Zisser won his appeal — his 2009 assessment was revised to $572,000, then later lowered to $565,000 for 2010 — but he said the process took about 40 hours of work to research, file paperwork and shepherd his case through the system.

“Dragging people through this is ridiculous,” he said, noting that he is still waiting for refunds.

He is not alone: 6,600 assessment appeals were filed in 2009, and another 5,500 in 2010.

Phil Ting, the city’s assessor-recorder, who is also a candidate for mayor, said he hoped fewer than 5,000 property owners would appeal their 2011 assessments. Value estimates are being mailed this month.

Mr. Ting said he had been able to settle 80 percent of appeals without full hearings, which he considered an accomplishment given the size of the task. Property values throughout much of the city remain down from pre-recession highs, prompting many owners to seek reassessment.

“This is not a market correction.” Mr. Ting said. “This is like a U.S. economy correction.”

To cope with the situation, this year his office has proactively reduced the assessments on 18,841 of 200,000 total parcels in the city — eliminating the need for those owners to appeal.

But despite these efforts, Mr. Ting said that the antiquated computer system he inherited when he took office in 2005 was a hindrance. “Think of it as Fred Flintstone,” he said.

Those limitations mean that owners cannot see exactly how their properties’ values were determined until an appeal is well under way — a situation that creates contention and requires time-consuming efforts to find information elsewhere (frustrations I experienced firsthand when I appealed my assessment, and won).

“We would like to have a more transparent system,” Mr. Ting said, noting that his office has been working on improving the computer system.

By comparison, in Santa Clara County in Silicon Valley, as of this year homeowners can go online, enter a privacy code and see their account in detail, including the county’s math. Disagree with the result? An appeal can also be done online.

Larry Stone, the Santa Clara County assessor, said, “Each year we’re adding electronic functionality to do what we do.”

Mr. Stone said that since the new system was installed, the culmination of 15 years and millions spent on innovation, inquiries to his office had dropped by half.

In the Sacramento area, according to Mr. Coupal, the taxpayer advocate, reduction appeals were handled at amiable weekend workshops for property owners.

As in San Francisco, other counties have proactively reduced assessments in recognition of the downturn. In Santa Clara County, Mr. Stone said that this year 124,148 properties (one-third of the county’s total) were assessed below their purchase price.

“But they are not legally required to do so,” Mr. Coupal said of the proactive reductions. Ultimately, “the burden is on the property owner,” he pointed out.

In San Francisco, Mr. Zisser just received his latest assessment: up $15,000 to $580,000. He disagrees with that figure, but said appealing this time was not worth the grief.

“The city has made the process adversarial so people won’t go through it,” he said.

Scott James is an Emmy-winning television journalist and novelist who lives in San Francisco.

sjames@baycitizen.org

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/22/us/22bcjames.html

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San Francisco Assessor-Recorder Phil Ting announced Thursday that the value of the City’s real estate grew by nearly $2 billion in the past fiscal year, a contrast to decreasing property values in most other parts of California.

The total roll assessment value, a combination of residential and commercial property values, grew by 1.3 percent to $163 billion during the fiscal year that ended June 30.

“We’re very, very fortunate in San Francisco,” Ting said. “We still have the strongest real estate market in the state.”

He said many homeowners are still worried about the real estate market but predicted “we’re going to see a continued resurgence” in the coming years.

Daniel Cressman, executive vice president of the commercial real estate company Grubb Ellis, said the value of the city’s commercial properties are doing particularly well.
   
San Francisco is “one of the very few markets in the entire country where investment demand for commercial office space is far outstripping the available supply that’s for sale,” Cressman said.
   
That has led to property value increases of up to 40 percent in recent years, he said.

John Lee, the former president of the San Francisco Association of Realtors, said the residential market is not doing as well, particularly for middle-class homeowners.

“People worried about jobs can’t commit to a long-term financial obligation,” Lee said.

He said, “I think the worst is behind us,” but predicted the next few years for the market will probably be about the same as the past one.

About 18,800 owners of single-family homes received a one-year temporary reduction last year in the assessed value of their properties, saving them a combined $27 million in taxes, Ting said.

Copyright Bay City News

Article source: http://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/SF-Real-Estate-Strongest-in-the-State-126021233.html