Please send to you state/local legislators

I wrote this and emailed it to my local representative as suggestion for legislation, but I figured you all might be able to make use of it too by sending it to your reps.

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Non-occupancy tax

Any residential unit (Accessory Dwelling Units excepted) that does not have a long term resident for more than 90 days for any reason will be subject to an excise tax of $0.50 per square foot of the residence per month. This tax shall not apply to unit that are being taxed as a hotel. This tax will be adjusted yearly according to CPI-W for the local area. 

To be considered a long term resident, a person must:

1. be an adult or emancipated minor and

2. must be 

a. an owner of the residence or 

b. have a rental agreement that lasts more than 30 days

Any person can only be considered a resident of one residential unit at a time. 

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Explanation:

This would hopefully decrease the number of unoccupied units (and those being used for ongoing AirBnBs) without having to worry about small landlords who only own one or two properties being involved, as a small landlord could have their spouse or adult child be the registered resident of their second property if they didn’t want to deal with changing the registration whenever a resident changed. But it also prevents this loophole from being used overused by limiting each individual to one residence. Exempting ADUs will prevent people from complaining that they’re being “forced to let people into their homes.” 90 days should also be plenty of time for any needed remodeling to occur, so landlords won’t be able to use that as an excuse to keep units open.

To prevent a negative impact to undocumented immigrants, measures would need to be taken such that ID is not required to be a resident, but random audits to ensure landlords aren’t just making up ‘residents’ would be needed. Provision will also need to be made for informal rental agreements that do not involve rent, and I am unsure of how squatters' rights may interact with this proposal. In addition, any revenue from the tax could be used to fund affordable or supported housing.