Question for those who live in California

[plowhog]

It seems that people who don’t live in CA think everyone lives in San Francisco or LA which has the worst reputation. Those cities are less than 10% of CA population and DO NOT reflect the quality of life addressed by most of the population

To be fair, those two cities, and a few others, control the outcome of elections. No matter how strong the vote is from less dense counties, those cities overwhelm the vote. The elected officials then dictate policy that prevails across the entire state, not just their location.

Here are a couple of comparisons:

- I own "traditional" residential rental property in both CA and Nevada. In CA, "rent control" limits me to a 5% annual increase in rent. Because of that, every year I raise rents 5% whether I want or need to-- since there is no makeup provision. If I miss a year, the "heavy hand of government" says the opportunity is lost forever. In the long run, does that really benefit the tenant?

In Nevada, there are no controls-- the market forces of supply and demand keep rents where they should be. I just increased rents last month due to rising costs. It was the first rent increase in 10 years. I am not motivated to raise rents annually, needed or not, because I have the flexibility to adjust to market forces as those forces emerge.

I built a luxury residence in NV-- over 5,000ft. Also a separate detached garage. Combined permits costs, all in for both, was about $3,500.

Permit cost to build a basic residence at my property in CA starts at $40k then goes up. Once they started adding road improvements, etc. it reached nearly $200k. Just for permitting, no construction. I'd really like to build a new/added residence there. But at $200k for a permit I said "no thanks."

In my view, the population of just a few cities does have an enormous impact.

 

[California]

I know of a few that are self insured…

They may have a liability policy but fire, flood, earthquake on their own.

Seems to me liability insurance is essential. Because then you have a professional to represent you, for even the most trivial issues. Learning enough to defend yourself would be a nightmare.

 

[ericm979]

It seems that people who don’t live in CA think everyone lives in San Francisco or LA which has the worst reputation. Those cities are less than 10% of CA population and DO NOT reflect the quality of life addressed by most of the population

Not only that but those cities problems are wildly exaggerated by the media and even their own politicians. I don't like going to SF because it's crowded but when I do I'm not worried about crime. It's actually pretty nice for a city.

 

[plowhog]

Sometimes the voting influence of large cities in CA can tip propositions to win or lose as well as candidates. A good example is CA Proposition 103-- designed to "reign in" insurance companies. From Wikipedia:

California voters passed Proposition 103 on November 8, 1988. It in effect made insurance companies require "prior approval" from the California Department of Insurance before implementing property and casualty insurance rates. It passed with 51% of the vote.

According to the California Insurance Commissioner, Proposition 103 "has saved consumers billions" since being implemented ...

[Comment: maybe the "billions saved" is from so many large insurance companies fleeing the state and cancelling everyone's policy. I guess it is a "savings" if you don't pay for insurance anymore because you can't get it? ]

 

[orezok]

I don’t understand how someone thinks 10% of the population controls the vote.

 

[California]

California voters passed Proposition 103 on November 8, 1988. It in effect made insurance companies require "prior approval" from the California Department of Insurance before implementing property and casualty insurance rates. It passed with 51% of the vote.

According to the California Insurance Commissioner, Proposition 103 "has saved consumers billions" since being implemented ...

[Comment: maybe the "billions saved" is from so many large insurance companies fleeing the state and cancelling everyone's policy. I guess it is a "savings" if you don't pay for insurance anymore because you can't get it? ]

That's likely the net savings over 35 years, since 1988. The companies were likely ok for 20~30 years and everything worked ok - before the recent incredible fires which caused them such losses that their rates were suddenly not sufficient.

Obviously the legislation now needs to be updated to allow the insurance companies to be profitable so they can return. Expect your cost to double or triple like in Florida. That's a model for what's coming, here.

Question - what are people doing, who get cancelled but are still required by their lender to carry insurance protecting the lender?

 

[bcp]

From:
California Demographics - Get Current Census Data for California


California (State) · Population: 39,356,104

California population by city:

Bruce

 

[KennyG]

I don’t understand how someone thinks 10% of the population controls the vote.

If only 10% of the voters show up, they control the vote. A current example: the New York Attorney General Alvin Bragg got 80% of the vote in the 2021 election. He got 211,000 votes. There were probably over 5 million eligible voters in that New York district.

From my time in Chicago I saw how this works. Chicago municipal and Cook County elections are always held at odd times when no other state or federal elections are schedules. Turnout is usually about 10% but all the government employees and teachers union members vote (or else).

 

[plowhog]

I don’t understand how someone thinks 10% of the population controls the vote.

I think the top 4 cities control more like 15% of the vote.

An election with a 10% victory margin is typically considered a blowout ...

I'm surprised anyone contests the influence of large cities on elections? I thought that has been long accepted .... maybe I need to get out more!!

 

[California]

Here's an interesting thread describing how corporations owning many rentals share a pricing service that ratchets up rents for all rentals whether or not an owner subscribes to the service. Anyone forced out by a sharp rent increase discovers that any alternative got raised too. Not much different from what we see with California insurance but this is nationwide.

Like that other place I referenced , Reddit allows anyone to post anything and the replies to a post are often more insightful than the original post. On Reddit the ratio of valuable/useless posts is awful, 90% is ads or kid's games, but there are also some real gems.

Sometimes its worth slogging through all that dross to learn a view of current events that is commented by real people instead of slanted media. In this case its the comments responding to a vid, which explain an issue that isn't well known.

Rent cartels are a thing now?​