Nope. Prop 13 allows transferring assessed value of the old house to the new house if it's in the same county. Even inter-county if the new county allows it. The assessed value is also preserved when the property is inherited by children and grandchildren. The number of carve-outs it has to favor incumbent landowners is pure insanity.[1]
EDIT: These were allowed to die in December, 2018.
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1978_California_Proposition_13...
Not even California has that, strictly speaking. California just sharply limits the rate of value assessment increase without qualifying events (mostly transfer outside of close family and new construction).
So tax the descendents. Property rights are one of the reasons why this country was founded..primary homes need to be protected from predatory taxes and redistribution of wealth.
Maybe they don’t want to profit out of capital gains. Maybe some people love their home of 30 years and would like to spend the reminder of their lives debt free after planning their retirement.
Seniors and retirees are such low impact on society. They have savings. They pay for services they don’t use. Their pensions and ssi is based on pre inflation valuations. They don’t use schools. Probably drive less and consume less and have a smaller carbon footprint. Most importantly they have already paid for themselves and probably paid their dues to society and several batches of public school kids.
To be envious of them and trying predatory taxation techniques on them is a breach and violation of social contract.
> Seniors and retirees are such low impact on society.
IIRC, medical care accounts for more government spending than all other discretionary spending combined. And most of medical care is going to be caring for seniors.
No, property taxes are paid on the assessed value, and assessments don't just happen at sale time. Only CA has this weird freeze-taxes-at-time-of-sale thing.
> It is not a punitive tax to fund new entrants.
No one is claiming it is. Hell, it isn't great even for homeowners who are "protected" by Prop 13, because if they want to move (say a widow/widower whose kids have moved out, living alone in a 3000 sq ft house who wants to downsize), they often can't, because their new property -- even if it's smaller! -- will destroy them with higher property taxes.
All this protects are people who never want to move, and, worse, it protects wealthy families who can pass their property down to their descendants without a market-rate tax.