Quote:
Originally Posted by RWebb
actually, the rest of the popn. has to pay for it!
it is a subsidy to those who live in far, sprawled out areas that probably should not have eve had house built there anyway. as you correctly note, some areas are prone to fire (chaparral ecosystems burn pretty regularly) and/or are prone to slides (SoCal area has uplift of weakly "glued together" rocks, and they fall apart with little provocation)
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Ah, but this aint new awlins.
These people pay big $$$$$ for these houses, so they pay big property taxes. Much more than most of us pay for our mortgages.
They also pay through the nose for homeowner's insurance, so I'm not sure how we can say the rest of us are paying for them.
I live down in the flat land where homes are safe from all this stuff.
But if the prado dam ever let go, I'd end up in Huntington beach instead of Orange.
There are some risks no matter where we live.
The main point was this: There are millions of these homes in So Cal. Many millions.
OK, so 4 or 5 houses got hit with a mud slide and 40 or 50 got burned up last year and the year before the numbers were much higher.
Folks naturally assume that they are representative of the houses in the area. They are not.
When you look at the percentages of homes that get threatened, it's not even a rounding error.
That vast, vast majority of people who live in these 'spensive canyons or hills can live there all their lives and not have a bit of worry.
The threat is exaggerated, the perception is not the reality. As long as you are not the unlucky one.