Yes! Make Home Ownership Great Again; end “rental serfdom” that is destroying Santa Barbara. Affordable rentals, public housing dominate the City. These rental projects — their occupants — do not pay property taxes that are essential to funding our failed SBUnified elementary schools and municipal services. Talk about an endless Free Ride in life. Worse, demands remain high for more, more, more!
Without ownership, Santa Barbara is becoming a ghetto at the direction of its City Council and our elected CA officials Senate Speaker Pro Tem and Assembly Rep Gregg Hart. We need new leadership in our Democrat controlled City, County and State.
Excellent. I'm hoping this will be read to our socialist Santa Barbara government at the next city and council meetings. I use “read to” rather than “read by” because they only know how to read the amount on their paychecks — from us. Btw, they love rent control. How about property tax control?
Polly- What’s your suggestion for “property tax control” beyond Prop 13? For starters, how about eliminating all property tax exemptions within SB County? Make all property owners pay toward the cost of municipal services, roads, law enforcement, schools, etc. Ending tax exemption on local assessed properties would increase revenues to offset any Prop 13 allowed 2% increases for the next 10+ years. Why don’t homeowners organize?
At last, someone who other than saying "socialism sucks" [true, and that's irrelevant when the people who are part of the younger generations don't care] actually realizes that socialism is gaining popularity among people because of their precarious economic situations, and their inability to ever acquire housing with modest incomes. Now the question is, is this something that appeals to the right, and especially the elected leaders or not?
Although I still roll my eyes at the privatization mentioned, simply because it's the go to philosophy of mainstream, economic conservatives. "The private sector is efficient!" It can be nauseating after so long of hearing the same rhetoric from people who otherwise may have less than ideal social and moral beliefs.
Excellent suggestion and a long overdue avenue to revisit, this country was built arround real estate ownership. Ownership breeds pride of ownership, tenancy has always bred contempt. An enhancement to the 1031 tax strategy to encourage individual sales is definitely doable, and I would also suggest an elimination of the capital gains tax to zero and/or tax credits for those, especially seniors, who sell real estate holding(s) to families
James, congratulations on your courageous, bold approach. Respectfully, I have my doubts on feasibility. What entity, other than government, will take on the risk of financing? How will buyers be able to afford these properties even at a substantial discount? How will it prevent scammers from out of town, scooping up multiple units? I fear a substantial bailout by taxpayers would be lurking somewhere on the horizon.
I’ve seen firsthand how local residential projects have been shaken down by the County into providing “affordable” units, whereby perspective homeowners enter a lottery in order to buy substantially discounted housing. In effect, shifting the cost to homeowners who pay market value. Originally, residents must reside in their subsidized units for 30 years before they can rent out or sell. Seemingly overnight, poof, the requirements were lowered to 10 years with owners either renting out their units or selling for a fast buck. All with little or no County oversight.
The main obstacle (as I see it), to young people buying homes, is the behemoth amount of student debt. The amount of debt is like an anchor around our youth’s neck. I know, my kids both have substantial student loans.
Secondly, we need to open up California into building new cities and communities. Get the California Costal Commission of the backs of development and in effect, “neuter” the CCC. Build up smaller communities, whereby land costs are much lower. Rethink public transportation from smaller outlining communities, Buellton, Guadalupe, Los Alamos, Lompoc etc.
Good points. As we have long learned in CA, any good idea can be turned on its head by progressive politicians. One reason I highlight the Russia privatization experience - other than my personal knowledge with it - is that even a society morally hollowed out by Marxism for generations can extricate themselves with simple, clear rules and enlightened self-interest. Perhaps I need to do a follow up describing how privatizing the SB Housing Authority would emancipate many of our town's rent serfs from the socialist grip and release millions in capital gains - that should be refunded to tax payers.
Well known “Housing Activist,” SB City Councilman, and liberal wack job, Oscar Gutierrez just recommended in open forum, during the Paseo Nuevo debate, that we give the land the mall sits on back to the Chumash. Citing “since it was their land originally,” and directed staff to waste time and staff hours formulating a plan!
How can we ever get serious about housing when we have incompetence like this on our City Council?
I was watching last night when he said that. . . good grief. I don't know what was more off putting, his comment or the many, many minutes of self grandiose speaking by Kristen Sneddon and my friend Eric Friedman. Did you notice Randy gently mocking all of them?
Thanks James for a thoughtful article that includes statistics for not only the problem but also for a potential approach to reducing it. SB City Council indicated its awareness of the problem when it decided that despite the City Administrator Ms. McAdoo salary of $353,000, which when benefits are included ballooned her compensation to $430,000., she needed a housing allowance of $3,500/mth. At what income level does the City Council feel a housing allowance is not necessary?
Very informative article that should be widely read in Santa Barbara. The home ownership statistics are frightening but the remedies that were supplied in this article sound like a good place to start. The problem I see is that there seems to be a clique of insiders here in Santa Barbara that appear to be doing very nicely under the present conditions and have no incentive to see it changed.
Well written, and logical. I predict that what will happen instead is that the attempt to repeal Prop 13 will begin with commercial property. Landlords will be included in the insidious propaganda that says "Make the Rich pay their fair share." When the credulous underclass votes for that, their rents will skyrocket as landlords give up and sell out to Blackrock and Vangard who intend for the mass of voters to be tenants forever. Then next the ballot proposition will go after individual home owners, and if I were required to pay tax on the current value on my home, massively inflated in "value" since I purchased it decades ago, I would be effectively a renter paying a huge annual stipend to the Government for what I thought I already paid for and own.
I see what you describe as being not just plausible, but probable. We have a certain history in this state which has the clown car rolling along on two (or more) flat tires. Yes, really well thought out article. From that keyboard to God's ears. It will take that sort of miracle. Those do happen....
James, good ideas. Not only would this create more homeowners, but it would frustrate the politicians that need a group or class of people that are perpetually beholden to politicians.
Private apartment building owners are going to voluntarily sell their units for 25% under market rate to people who even with that discount couldn't come close to finding the $ for a down payment or qualify for a mortgage? Not sure how the 'math will math' although I appreciate the outside the box thinking. But let's stop with the disparagement of what you term 'government' schools. As far as I know you sent your kids to public schools and they got a good education no doubt despite your hand wringing.
One of the less-appreciated benefits of transitioning publicly owned housing (or encouraging private landlords to convert rental apartments into condominiums) is that many of these properties are carried on the books at their original historical cost — often decades old. When these assets are sold, even at a meaningful discount to today’s fair market value, the transaction can generate substantial realized gains. In the case of public housing authorities, those gains could be returned to taxpayers rather than remaining locked in an artificially low book value.For private apartment owners, the same dynamic applies in a slightly different way. More than 85% of California’s multifamily stock is over 20 years old, which means most owners are sitting on very large embedded capital gains — often several times their original purchase price. If meaningful capital-gains tax relief were offered as an incentive for owners to sell individual units to their existing tenants (similar to a right-of-first-refusal program with tax advantages), many landlords would likely accept sale prices well below the current open-market condo value. They could still walk away with attractive after-tax proceeds while passing significant savings on to tenants.In short: the greater the tax incentive, the lower the price at which owners would be willing to offer units to their renters. Older properties, unlike newly built ones that command a premium, naturally come to market at more accessible levels when the primary motivation shifts from maximizing gross proceeds to optimizing after-tax outcomes.This approach — using targeted tax policy to encourage the conversion of rental apartments into individually owned homes and simultaneously reducing government involvement in direct housing ownership — is not yet widely discussed, but it could be a powerful tool for expanding homeownership opportunities in California.
When at least half of the students graduating our public schools can't do 7th grade math or are less than proficient in English, they deserve to be disparaged. One of eight students admitted to UC San Diego can't do 8th grade math. They are suppose to be our academically elite and yet here we are. I have a novel idea, let someone else run our schools. Govt has proven they are very bad at running anything, no less our schools. Accountability is a dirty word in our public schools.
Thanks James for the intriguing suggestions, especially from your perspective. Having skin in the game is definitely the only way everyone gets on the same page. From an old time realtor's perspective, I also think more single family homes and condos will need to be built for move-up buyers, but not first timers. Theoretically this would free up older housing which becomes more affordable than brand new product and older houses are where most of us started, especially in SB. No way you can build from ground up here and make it "affordable" nor should anyone expect you to. SB
Yes! Make Home Ownership Great Again; end “rental serfdom” that is destroying Santa Barbara. Affordable rentals, public housing dominate the City. These rental projects — their occupants — do not pay property taxes that are essential to funding our failed SBUnified elementary schools and municipal services. Talk about an endless Free Ride in life. Worse, demands remain high for more, more, more!
Without ownership, Santa Barbara is becoming a ghetto at the direction of its City Council and our elected CA officials Senate Speaker Pro Tem and Assembly Rep Gregg Hart. We need new leadership in our Democrat controlled City, County and State.
Bravo Monte, time to call out NFP’s scooping up properties and paying NO property taxes. UCSB and The Land Conservancy for starters!
James, great article! We need to get this message out to the politicians and all the voters! This really could be a "turning point" for our country!
Excellent. I'm hoping this will be read to our socialist Santa Barbara government at the next city and council meetings. I use “read to” rather than “read by” because they only know how to read the amount on their paychecks — from us. Btw, they love rent control. How about property tax control?
Polly- What’s your suggestion for “property tax control” beyond Prop 13? For starters, how about eliminating all property tax exemptions within SB County? Make all property owners pay toward the cost of municipal services, roads, law enforcement, schools, etc. Ending tax exemption on local assessed properties would increase revenues to offset any Prop 13 allowed 2% increases for the next 10+ years. Why don’t homeowners organize?
At last, someone who other than saying "socialism sucks" [true, and that's irrelevant when the people who are part of the younger generations don't care] actually realizes that socialism is gaining popularity among people because of their precarious economic situations, and their inability to ever acquire housing with modest incomes. Now the question is, is this something that appeals to the right, and especially the elected leaders or not?
Although I still roll my eyes at the privatization mentioned, simply because it's the go to philosophy of mainstream, economic conservatives. "The private sector is efficient!" It can be nauseating after so long of hearing the same rhetoric from people who otherwise may have less than ideal social and moral beliefs.
Thank you, TheotokosAppreciator. Praise from you is high praise indeed.
Very good, James. My first home in SB cost $23,000. I sold it for $27,000 and was so excited I made a profit. My have times changed.
Excellent suggestion and a long overdue avenue to revisit, this country was built arround real estate ownership. Ownership breeds pride of ownership, tenancy has always bred contempt. An enhancement to the 1031 tax strategy to encourage individual sales is definitely doable, and I would also suggest an elimination of the capital gains tax to zero and/or tax credits for those, especially seniors, who sell real estate holding(s) to families
or to those working at lower wages.
James, congratulations on your courageous, bold approach. Respectfully, I have my doubts on feasibility. What entity, other than government, will take on the risk of financing? How will buyers be able to afford these properties even at a substantial discount? How will it prevent scammers from out of town, scooping up multiple units? I fear a substantial bailout by taxpayers would be lurking somewhere on the horizon.
I’ve seen firsthand how local residential projects have been shaken down by the County into providing “affordable” units, whereby perspective homeowners enter a lottery in order to buy substantially discounted housing. In effect, shifting the cost to homeowners who pay market value. Originally, residents must reside in their subsidized units for 30 years before they can rent out or sell. Seemingly overnight, poof, the requirements were lowered to 10 years with owners either renting out their units or selling for a fast buck. All with little or no County oversight.
The main obstacle (as I see it), to young people buying homes, is the behemoth amount of student debt. The amount of debt is like an anchor around our youth’s neck. I know, my kids both have substantial student loans.
Secondly, we need to open up California into building new cities and communities. Get the California Costal Commission of the backs of development and in effect, “neuter” the CCC. Build up smaller communities, whereby land costs are much lower. Rethink public transportation from smaller outlining communities, Buellton, Guadalupe, Los Alamos, Lompoc etc.
https://youtu.be/xXTHkEeeT7w?si=oPXpRkS892bIdyId
Good points. As we have long learned in CA, any good idea can be turned on its head by progressive politicians. One reason I highlight the Russia privatization experience - other than my personal knowledge with it - is that even a society morally hollowed out by Marxism for generations can extricate themselves with simple, clear rules and enlightened self-interest. Perhaps I need to do a follow up describing how privatizing the SB Housing Authority would emancipate many of our town's rent serfs from the socialist grip and release millions in capital gains - that should be refunded to tax payers.
Well known “Housing Activist,” SB City Councilman, and liberal wack job, Oscar Gutierrez just recommended in open forum, during the Paseo Nuevo debate, that we give the land the mall sits on back to the Chumash. Citing “since it was their land originally,” and directed staff to waste time and staff hours formulating a plan!
How can we ever get serious about housing when we have incompetence like this on our City Council?
https://www.noozhawk.com/paseo-nuevo-housing-plan-falls-short-with-santa-barbara-council/
Oscar is a clown. We just need to think of solutions deeper and sell our ideas better.
I was watching last night when he said that. . . good grief. I don't know what was more off putting, his comment or the many, many minutes of self grandiose speaking by Kristen Sneddon and my friend Eric Friedman. Did you notice Randy gently mocking all of them?
Right on James. Great ideas. Homeownership is the way, not lifelong renting.
Thanks James for a thoughtful article that includes statistics for not only the problem but also for a potential approach to reducing it. SB City Council indicated its awareness of the problem when it decided that despite the City Administrator Ms. McAdoo salary of $353,000, which when benefits are included ballooned her compensation to $430,000., she needed a housing allowance of $3,500/mth. At what income level does the City Council feel a housing allowance is not necessary?
Good question. But it seems like Sansum/Sutter needs to help out new docs. https://www.independent.com/2025/11/17/1-million-gift-energizes-physician-housing-and-recruitment-in-santa-barbara/
Very informative article that should be widely read in Santa Barbara. The home ownership statistics are frightening but the remedies that were supplied in this article sound like a good place to start. The problem I see is that there seems to be a clique of insiders here in Santa Barbara that appear to be doing very nicely under the present conditions and have no incentive to see it changed.
Well written, and logical. I predict that what will happen instead is that the attempt to repeal Prop 13 will begin with commercial property. Landlords will be included in the insidious propaganda that says "Make the Rich pay their fair share." When the credulous underclass votes for that, their rents will skyrocket as landlords give up and sell out to Blackrock and Vangard who intend for the mass of voters to be tenants forever. Then next the ballot proposition will go after individual home owners, and if I were required to pay tax on the current value on my home, massively inflated in "value" since I purchased it decades ago, I would be effectively a renter paying a huge annual stipend to the Government for what I thought I already paid for and own.
I see what you describe as being not just plausible, but probable. We have a certain history in this state which has the clown car rolling along on two (or more) flat tires. Yes, really well thought out article. From that keyboard to God's ears. It will take that sort of miracle. Those do happen....
James, good ideas. Not only would this create more homeowners, but it would frustrate the politicians that need a group or class of people that are perpetually beholden to politicians.
Yes, it is a revolutionary idea. Power back to the people.
Great ideas. Thanks for laying this out in a readable and easily understandable way.
Nice ideas. Keep it up.
Private apartment building owners are going to voluntarily sell their units for 25% under market rate to people who even with that discount couldn't come close to finding the $ for a down payment or qualify for a mortgage? Not sure how the 'math will math' although I appreciate the outside the box thinking. But let's stop with the disparagement of what you term 'government' schools. As far as I know you sent your kids to public schools and they got a good education no doubt despite your hand wringing.
One of the less-appreciated benefits of transitioning publicly owned housing (or encouraging private landlords to convert rental apartments into condominiums) is that many of these properties are carried on the books at their original historical cost — often decades old. When these assets are sold, even at a meaningful discount to today’s fair market value, the transaction can generate substantial realized gains. In the case of public housing authorities, those gains could be returned to taxpayers rather than remaining locked in an artificially low book value.For private apartment owners, the same dynamic applies in a slightly different way. More than 85% of California’s multifamily stock is over 20 years old, which means most owners are sitting on very large embedded capital gains — often several times their original purchase price. If meaningful capital-gains tax relief were offered as an incentive for owners to sell individual units to their existing tenants (similar to a right-of-first-refusal program with tax advantages), many landlords would likely accept sale prices well below the current open-market condo value. They could still walk away with attractive after-tax proceeds while passing significant savings on to tenants.In short: the greater the tax incentive, the lower the price at which owners would be willing to offer units to their renters. Older properties, unlike newly built ones that command a premium, naturally come to market at more accessible levels when the primary motivation shifts from maximizing gross proceeds to optimizing after-tax outcomes.This approach — using targeted tax policy to encourage the conversion of rental apartments into individually owned homes and simultaneously reducing government involvement in direct housing ownership — is not yet widely discussed, but it could be a powerful tool for expanding homeownership opportunities in California.
When at least half of the students graduating our public schools can't do 7th grade math or are less than proficient in English, they deserve to be disparaged. One of eight students admitted to UC San Diego can't do 8th grade math. They are suppose to be our academically elite and yet here we are. I have a novel idea, let someone else run our schools. Govt has proven they are very bad at running anything, no less our schools. Accountability is a dirty word in our public schools.
Thanks James for the intriguing suggestions, especially from your perspective. Having skin in the game is definitely the only way everyone gets on the same page. From an old time realtor's perspective, I also think more single family homes and condos will need to be built for move-up buyers, but not first timers. Theoretically this would free up older housing which becomes more affordable than brand new product and older houses are where most of us started, especially in SB. No way you can build from ground up here and make it "affordable" nor should anyone expect you to. SB