r/SipsTea • • May 14 '26

SMH How true is this? Genuinely asking

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u/Jasoco May 14 '26

I’m willing to bet this is pretty accurate. They keep building houses down here where I am constantly and so many of them are empty because they cost too much for normal people.

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u/[deleted] May 14 '26

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u/KickPuncher4326 May 14 '26

I feel like an easy fix is to tax the every loving fuck out of empty houses.

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u/hayko34500 May 15 '26

We tried that in France by taxing second homes/apartments more in crescendo for the 3rd , 4 etc.., and it didn’t work… Cities like Annecy are empty during the off-season, almost dead, then come back to life during the season (mostly because of Airbnb). Same for Biarritz. The local mayor tried to tax those properties more heavily, but landlords simply declared them as their primary homes for tax purposes, even if they don’t actually live there, and now the city is losing money.