[Advogado]

Originally Posted by biker1

What would the impact fee have to be increased by to offset the approximately 25% increase in the County Tax of 2019?

That will have to be determined by the results of an impact study.

As another poster earlier explained, the amount of impact fees has to be determined by a calculation of the infrastructure costs imposed on the county by the new construction. That is why the County Commission needs to immediately contract for a study of the cost of non-road infrastructure.

An impact-fee study was done in 2019 with respect only to roads, and then the puppet commissioners only imposed a road impact fee in 40% of the amount justified by the study-- while increasing our taxes by 25%. Thus, it would seem, on the basis of that study, the current ROAD impact fee could immediately be increased by 150%, i.e. up to 100% of the amount shown in the 2019 study.

[dewilson58]

Originally Posted by Advogado

That will have to be determined by the results of an impact study.

As another poster earlier explained, the amount of impact fees has to be determined by a calculation of the infrastructure costs imposed on the county by the new construction. That is why the County Commission needs to immediately contract for a study of the cost of non-road infrastructure.

An impact-fee study was done in 2019 with respect only to roads, and then the puppet commissioners only imposed a road impact fee in 40% of the amount justified by the study-- while increasing our taxes by 25%. Thus, it would seem, on the basis of that study, the current ROAD impact fee could immediately be increased by 150%, i.e. up to 100% of the amount shown in the 2019 study.

A Swing and A Miss.


Biker asked, "What would the impact fee have to be increased by to offset the approximately 25% increase ". That has NOTHING to do with the cost of the infrastructure. Nothing. It's simple math. Taxes increased, say, $50,000,000. Divide that by the 3,000 new homes. Boom..........+$15,000 fee increase.


Your math......150% increase time 3,000 new homes = about $4,000,000. A tad short.


Like Biker said, qualitative nonsense.

[Advogado]

Originally Posted by biker1

I know, it was a thinly veiled attempt to find out if Avogadro actually knows any real numbers or is just spouting a bunch of qualitative nonsense. I agree with you that if the number is relatively small, say less than 10K, it can be passed through to the buyers without issue as they don’t seem to have any problems selling every house they can build. You have an idea what the real number is ? I couldn’t begin to guess without spending a bunch of time.

Concrete numbers will need to await the outcome of an impact study of the cost of non-road infrastructure necessitated by the massive expansion of The Villages. I have never claimed to have the numbers resulting from imposition of a non-sweetheart impact fee, and I don't think that they yet exist.

With respect to the question of how much of an increased impact fee the Developer will be able to pass on to new home buyers, I don't know and don't particularly care. I will point out though that IF the Developer could pass on your theoretical 10K impact to buyers without reducing sales and profits, he would have already increased his prices by 10K-- or he should fire his CFO for leaving money on the table. In any event, with an appropriate impact fee (whether or not it is all passed on to new-home buyers), you and I, the current residents, will not be paying for the new infrastructure.

[biker1]

OK, so you don’t know. Pretty much what I suspected.

Originally Posted by Advogado

That will have to be determined by the results of an impact study.

As another poster earlier explained, the amount of impact fees has to be determined by a calculation of the infrastructure costs imposed on the county by the new construction. That is why the County Commission needs to immediately contract for a study of the cost of non-road infrastructure.

An impact-fee study was done in 2019 with respect only to roads, and then the puppet commissioners only imposed a road impact fee in 40% of the amount justified by the study-- while increasing our taxes by 25%. Thus, it would seem, on the basis of that study, the current ROAD impact fee could immediately be increased by 150%, i.e. up to 100% of the amount shown in the 2019 study.

[Advogado]

Originally Posted by dewilson58

A Swing and A Miss.


Biker asked, "What would the impact fee have to be increased by to offset the approximately 25% increase ". That has NOTHING to do with the cost of the infrastructure. Nothing. It's simple math. Taxes increased, say, $50,000,000. Divide that by the 3,000 new homes. Boom..........+$15,000 fee increase.


Your math......150% increase time 3,000 new homes = about $4,000,000. A tad short.


Like Biker said, qualitative nonsense.

I am sorry, but I don't understand what you are talking about.

For starters, the new Villages area will consist of something like 50,000 additional homes. Increasing the ROAD impact fee by 150% would bring in roughly $1,200 more per home. That is an additional $60,000,000 of tax revenue from just home construction. I do not know how much more would come in from commercial construction and from impact fees for such infrastructure as government buildings, parks, libraries, etc., nor can I say (without seeing the results of an impact study) how much of the 25% tax hike can be rolled back-- maybe it all could be plus a further tax reduction.

You seem to forget that the justification of the tax increase was to pay for new county infrastructure, especially roads. If that is paid for via impact fees, it would seem that the tax increase should be rolled back completely.

[biker1]

I will admit that I do not know the Developer's pricing model but I would guess that it may be similar to several companies I worked for. We typically had a gross margin target we were trying to hit. If the cost went up, the price went up. We dropped products when we could not compete at the gross margins we needed. The average price of new homes is probably about $300K. Let us assume, for the moment because of the lack of any real data, the impact fee needed to go to $10K. That is an average increase of about 3%. I can't speak for everyone but that (a straight pass through of an increased impact fee) would not have been an impediment to us when deciding to buy a new home in The Villages. Can we agree that without any real numbers this thread is just a bunch of speculative nonsense?

Originally Posted by Advogado

Concrete numbers will need to await the outcome of an impact study of the cost of non-road infrastructure necessitated by the massive expansion of The Villages. I have never claimed to have the numbers resulting from imposition of a non-sweetheart impact fee, and I don't think that they yet exist.

With respect to the question of how much of an increased impact fee the Developer will be able to pass on to new home buyers, I don't know and don't particularly care. I will point out though that IF the Developer could pass on your theoretical 10K impact to buyers without reducing sales and profits, he would have already increased his prices by 10K-- or he should fire his CFO for leaving money on the table. In any event, with an appropriate impact fee (whether or not it is all passed on to new-home buyers), you and I, the current residents, will not be paying for the new infrastructure.

[dewilson58]

Originally Posted by Advogado

I am sorry, but I don't understand what you are talking about. .

Bingo!!!!!


The 25% increase of approx $50mil is annually.
"You" must look at annual builds............which is about 3,000 per year right now.
Biker asked the increase to cover the $50mil ANNUAL increase.


If you are looking at the total 50,000 new homes......which is probably +10 years of construction, the 25% increase (all things being equal) will amount to 1/2 a TRILLION dollars.


Keep trying.

[Bogie Shooter]

Originally Posted by biker1

I will admit that I do not know the Developer's pricing model but I would guess that it may be similar to several companies I worked for. We typically had a gross margin target we were trying to hit. If the cost went up, the price went up. We dropped products when we could not compete at the gross margins we needed. The average price of new homes is probably about $300K. If we assume, for the moment because of the lack of any real data, the impact fee needed to go to $10K. That is an average increase of about 3%. I can't speak for everyone but that would not have been an impediment to us when deciding to buy a new home in The Villages. Can we agree that without any real numbers this thread is just a bunch of speculative nonsense?

But, it does continue to stir up the masses.....

[dewilson58]

Thru all this, do you know what I wished the county would have done????


Issued a Special Revenue Bond and had future NEW property taxes pay off the bonds.


If there are 3,000 house being constructed each year, (what's the average assessed value??) for say $300,000 each, this would generate about $7,000,000 in new tax revenue every year. After ten years of growth @ 3,000 per year...........that's $300mil in tax collections. Plenty to pay off the Special Revenue Bonds.


I wish.

[Advogado]

Originally Posted by biker1

I will admit that I do not know the Developer's pricing model but I would guess that it may be similar to several companies I worked for. We typically had a gross margin target we were trying to hit. If the cost went up, the price went up. We dropped products when we could not compete at the gross margins we needed. The average price of new homes is probably about $300K. If we assume, for the moment because of the lack of any real data, the impact fee needed to go to $10K. That is an average increase of about 3%. I can't speak for everyone but that would not have been an impediment to us when deciding to buy a new home in The Villages. Can we agree that without any real numbers this thread is just a bunch of speculative nonsense?

No, we cannot agree on that. I think you (and others who expect exact numbers at this point) are completely missing the point.

The issue here is a policy one: Does the Developer (through a reasonable impact fee) or do the current residents (through a 25% tax hike) pay for county infrastructure costs necessitated by the Developer's massive expansion of The Villages?

That question was resoundingly answered by the voters this year by roughly a two to one margin when they elected to EMS Team (despite the Developer's massive spending and perhaps illegal use of fake candidates to disenfranchise voters). The decision was: THE DEVELOPER, NOT US, MUST PAY! You need to understand that that is no longer open for discussion; only the details need to be worked out.

As explained by an earlier poster, the exact numbers will have to be determined by an impact study, but the Developer, not us, the current residents, MUST pay for the Developer's infrastructure. How much of that cost the Developer can pass on to new home buyers and commercial renters will be determined by market forces and shouldn't really matter to current residents.

[biker1]

I am not missing any point. The Developer will not pay. Any additional costs will be passed through to the buyers. By the way, I don’t have a problem with that. Did you work for the Federal or a state government?

Stop with the disenfranchised voter rhetoric. If someone wanted to vote in the primary they could have by changing their affiliation.

Originally Posted by Advogado

No, we cannot agree on that. I think you are completely missing the point.

The issue here is a policy one: Does the Developer (through a reasonable impact fee) or do the current residents (through a 25% tax hike) pay for county infrastructure costs necessitated by the Developer's massive expansion of The Villages?

That question was resoundingly answered by the voters this year by roughly a two to one margin when they elected to EMS Team (despite the Developer's massive spending and perhaps illegal use of fake candidates to disenfranchise voters). The decision was: THE DEVELOPER, NOT US, MUST PAY! You need to understand that that is no longer open for discussion; only the details need to be worked out.

As explained by an earlier poster, the exact numbers will have to be determined by an impact study, but the Developer, not us, the current residents, MUST pay for the Developer's infrastructure. How much of that cost the Developer can pass on to new home buyers and commercial renters will be determined by market forces and shouldn't really matter to current residents.

[loweglor]

Silly me, I always thought that housing developers paid impact fees because they significantly change property they own plus tie into utility services provided by the town/city/county. A basic explanation but you get the point. Now, in the case of housing, the impact of these connections to a city/town/county is extremely significant which could lead one to believe that the impact fees would be fairly high. However, it has been published in a number of articles that the developer received a fairly large discount on the impact fees they paid. In fact, it was considerably less than the standard fees paid by other developers for housing projects throughout, at least, central Florida. Is the developer happy? Of course. His bottom line jumped up for each house he built. Is the home buyer happy? Not when their taxes went up 25% in one year to cover........... what? Road improvements? Budget deficits? Poor local government management, that's what. The bottom line for the developer increased with the help of local government and the people.............. hey, buyer beware. Perhaps it's time for people to wake up. Your bottom line is being impacted.......... what are you going to do about it?

[tophcfa]

Originally Posted by dewilson58

Thru all this, do you know what I wished the county would have done????


Issued a Special Revenue Bond and had future NEW property taxes pay off the bonds.


If there are 3,000 house being constructed each year, (what's the average assessed value??) for say $300,000 each, this would generate about $7,000,000 in new tax revenue every year. After ten years of growth @ 3,000 per year...........that's $300mil in tax collections. Plenty to pay off the Special Revenue Bonds.

I wish.

Well, that was in fact a helpful post, and I agree, I also wish that was how the developer decided to pay the impact fee. I guess that begs the question, why do you suppose they chose to not issue a Special Revenue Bond, and instead took the path of forcing existing Sumter County residents to foot the bill for a large portion of the impact fees?

[dewilson58]

Originally Posted by tophcfa

Well, that was in fact a helpful post, and I agree, I also wish that was how the developer decided to pay the impact fee. I guess that begs the question, why do you suppose they chose to not issue a Special Revenue Bond, and instead took the path of forcing existing Sumter County residents to foot the bill for a large portion of the impact fees?

My Guess: Inexperienced commissioners & county finance staff. None of them have been faced with the issue and did not know what to do. I think Sumter would have been successful in issuing a bond. The new commissioners have even less experience. Oh Boy.

[Velvet]

Originally Posted by biker1

I will admit that I do not know the Developer's pricing model but I would guess that it may be similar to several companies I worked for. We typically had a gross margin target we were trying to hit. If the cost went up, the price went up. We dropped products when we could not compete at the gross margins we needed. The average price of new homes is probably about $300K. Let us assume, for the moment because of the lack of any real data, the impact fee needed to go to $10K. That is an average increase of about 3%. I can't speak for everyone but that (a straight pass through of an increased impact fee) would not have been an impediment to us when deciding to buy a new home in The Villages. Can we agree that without any real numbers this thread is just a bunch of speculative nonsense?

Nope, not speculative. The property tax money really did come out of my bank account. I can vouch for that.