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TAXES FONCIERE AND HABITATION


Angie
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[quote user="5-element"]You don't think that assets should be taken into account, then?[/quote]

How many times should tax be applied to the same thing?

If I pay tax on my income, rent a flat and buy a Ferrari I'm not taxed on the value of that;
so if someone who has paid tax on their income and chooses to buy a house and a renault
why should they be taxed on the difference in their assets?

 

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robert8n, yes, the governement will take your property if you cannot pay your bills. If they didn't why wouldn't we all buy something we couldn't afford and not pay the bills and just live because we believe it is 'ours'.

Remember a lot, perhaps most french people rent. Now I'm sure that they would be delighted that some foreigner is allowed not to pay their bills, especially their owners tax. It is no one elses fault but our own if we chose to not live within our means. Pity governments cannot do the same

And these taxes in a lot of France are high, people should budget for them.

.
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idun: To address your stated opinion as opposed to government policy.

"If they didn't why wouldn't we all buy something we couldn't afford and not pay the bills and just live because we believe it is 'ours'."

LOL Well maybe we "beleive it is 'ours'" because 'we' bought and paid for it 100%, not on credit. It belongs to us, not the state.

I don't think this has anything whatsoever to do with French vs foreigners, or people 'choosing' not to live within their means, or not paying bills in general, as you keep implying.

It is specific to tax, and the amount of tax paid, based on ability to pay at an unforeseen time of hardship.

The consequences of your belief in a blanket application of pay up, move or face forced eviction regardless of circumstance or credit history, can be seen in the US where formally (employed) hard-working middle-class people now live in their cars, tent cities or shelters. This pitiless model of capitalism is alien to France and I hope remains so. As others have said, Taxe d'habitation evidently can be reduced on appeal.

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Are you for real.

You have been told that the taxe d'habitation is linked to earnings and I suppose ability to pay. We are now talking about an 'owners tax'.

Firstly, buying a property is not 'just' buying the bricks and mortar, it is as maintaining it, being able to heat it and pay all the bills pertaining to it TTC. Anyone who choses to not adhere to those very simple ideas will end up in bother if they over spend on the building and not on the 'living'!

We paid off our mortgage several years ago and sold our house and bought a new one recently. Guess what we did? I may not be the brightest person on the planet, but I do understand very basic housekeeping.

And if you think that you will get your bill reduced on appeal, well, be careful, I know where it has gone up even further. As we have seen on this thread some people pay next to nothing, but that is not how it is in a lot of France. NormanH has posted a link on another thread.

I have been led to believe that going to see the tax man in rags and pleading abject poverty works in Italy, true or false I don't know, it wouldn't work in France though.

NB France has improved somewhat since 1981, it used to be very cruel and hard when people were in dire straights.
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I think that this says it all really.

France doesn't want any etranger who cannot pay their own way.

Droit au séjour

Conditions exigées

Pour disposer d'un droit au séjour en qualité de "non-actif", les intéressés doivent remplir certaines conditions.

Les retraités et autres inactifs doivent disposer, pour eux et les membres de leur famille, de ressources suffisantes pour ne pas devenir une charge pour le système d'assistance sociale français et d'une assurance maladie-maternité.

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Think that just about sums it up. For most things these days you need to supply a copy of your 'Impots' which basically means your declaring an income in France and paying tax here. In fact by having one of these forms so many doors open for you. Its a shame the UK does not take the same attitude, pay nothing in then you get nothing out. [:D]
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I sometimes look at an Irish forum where people are complaining bitterly at the very idea that property taxes might be introduced. They use the same strange argument ie that they`ve paid for their house and ought not to be taxed on it`s value.

Could maybe be one of the reasons why Ireland`s economy is in such a mess.
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LOL: and the British economy is a shining example of success then. Try not to betray your prejudices so blatantly.

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, the point is not not to pay, the point is to pay according to your present income/wealth.

And no, personally I do not find it an extraordinary idea that you should not have to pay taxes on a property you have bought and paid for. Services yes, property no. Historically this is a relatively recent invention. Most of you Brits posting on here do whatever your government tells you, you bend over and take it, without question.

As can be seen from the present situation in France, they do not. One of the reasons France is a better place to live than the UK in my opinion.
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[quote user="robert8n"]LOL: and the British economy is a shining example of success then. Try not to betray your prejudices so blatantly. At the risk of sounding like a broken record, the point is not not to pay, the point is to pay according to your present income/wealth. And no, personally I do not find it an extraordinary idea that you should not have to pay taxes on a property you have bought and paid for. Services yes, property no. Historically this is a relatively recent invention. Most of you Brits posting on here do whatever your government tells you, you bend over and take it, without question. As can be seen from the present situation in France, they do not. One of the reasons France is a better place to live than the UK in my opinion.[/quote]

I do not know about some people on here but 20 years ago instead of just paying based on the perceived rental value of a property a tax irrespective of how many lived in the dwelling a Poll Tax was introduced.

Basically, for each person over a certain age an amount was payable. Thereby, the house with two parents and three adult children paid five lots of poll tax whilst the house with the elderly widow who lived alone paid just one lot.

Huge uproar and protests and it was dropped.

The winners - the house with loads of people, the losers the house with the litle old lady.

The Poll Tax to me seemed the fairer system - paying for what you use. The little old lady with her small amount of rubbish to be collected and the family of five who would have a vast amount of rubbish paying proportionately.

What happens now? The little old lady pays the same as the family of five.

Perhaps not too hard to guess which household was the most vociferous about wanting the Poll Tax scrapped.

Paul

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[quote user="PaulT"]

[quote user="ITMA"]I thought that. "The little old lady" gets a discount for living alone?
[/quote]

The discount is 25% - so she pays 75% of what the family of 5 adults pays.

[/quote]This assumes that the little old lady lives in a house which would be big enough to house 5 adults though.  My mother moans about this but she lives in a one bedroomed flat thus its rental value is ipso facto, far lower than a house which five people could live comfortably in.  But she doesn't seem to get this at all!  It isn't that daft, imo, to judge a person's ability to pay by the size and value of their property - it surely reflects to some extent upon their overall wealth and if they can't afford to live there then maybe they should consider downsizing?  It might certainly be an option for this little old lady who apparently pays more than 5 adults living together in one house.

Personally I would favour a combination of the two - something which took into account the property value and the number of people using the facilities linked to it. 

In the UK I paid rates then council tax for years which went to pay to educate kids of which I have none.  I didn't refuse to pay just because I didn't use the schools though.  Should I have done?

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This is how I see it, and although I hold to no ideology it is close to the way Libertarians see it. Your house, your home (I do not see my home as as 'asset' or investment as many people do these days), is bought and paid for, (assuming mortgage paid if you had a mortgage) during the process of which you have already paid numerous taxes anyway. Now it's yours, or it should be. And it should be out of the tax equation - a home should be sacrosanct and never under threat of confiscation from the state in a purportedly developed/advanced society, and I don't care if it's a castle or a hovel - it's yours! Leave it alone! Then comes the question how do we pay for the services that we get from the state/society (many people seem to forget that you're supposed to actually get something for the taxes you pay). I do believe in tax, unlike my Libertarian friends, but the tax should depend on ones income, whether that be from from salary or pension, stock dividends, or from other properties etc. If the income rises - you pay more, you can afford it, if it falls you pay less, it seems an infinitely fair system in my view. But nobody should ever be threatened with eviction and or homelessness if they have paid for their home.

Note: Unlike Idun, I distinguish between tax - paid to government, which can be legislated to be income based, and bills paid to private corporations which are subject to market forces and should be either paid, or you reduce your consumption to a level you can pay.

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We bought a barn extended it on all sides because we like space. Did all the work ourselves. Haven't bought any new clothes for 12 years, run a 20 year old car, lived in a caravan for 10 years until we got part of the barn habitable. Still haven't got a bath or shower but we pay 550 Euros Tax Fonc and 500 for TH for the 65 sq mtrs we have completed. 12 years ago when we started the project TF & TH were nowhere near the levels they are now. There is no way we can afford TH & TF to make the rest of the building habitable. Should have bought a decent car instead of praying we get there!! It would be lovely to have some new clothes and a wash. Why should I be penalised for wanting a decent home?

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Living within the means and the comfort level of earners is never likely to happen when you have politicians in control of the money.

Fair taxation is only possible when a single flat rate sales tax is applied to all earnings, services, and products.

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[quote user="Poppy"]Why should I be penalised for wanting a decent home?
[/quote]This assumes that you view taxes as a penalty.  To me they are the price one pays for public services, whether one uses them or not. 

The alternative is to return to the days when we had to rely on the goodwill of others to support those less fortunate - something which it appears to me is in short supply these days.

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This assumes that you view taxes as a penalty. To me they are the price one pays for public services, whether one uses them or not.

The alternative is to return to the days when we had to rely on the goodwill of others to support those less fortunate - something which it appears to me is in short supply these days.

No I do not view tax as a penalty but I think that most voters are divorced from making any value judgments. If the general tax was set at say 15% (with no exceptions) then a voter could simply ask the party leader to set their proposed rate and decide on that basis. A truly democratic system would also a allow total opt out of certain aspects. Example do you want to be part of the governments pension scheme, national health service…………

My view is that government spending generally destroys wealth. With far less interference I believe that true wealth will increase. It probably costs less than five to ten years worth of average work to pay the total cost of labour and materials to build a house (which can then be passed on to multiple generations). Our brilliant distortion of the market usually means that successive generations end up working for decades to achieve the same result. The delusion also persist that the UK has the best health service in the world, fine if you believe that contribute, if you don’t make alternative arrangements or not.
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