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Ballot Initiative Seeks to Eliminate Prop 13 for Commercial and Industrial Real Estate

TAKEAWAYS New initiative seeks to eliminate Proposition 13 protection for commercial and industrial property by requiring fair market value reassessments at least every three years Initiative seeks to add a $500,000 tangible personal property tax exemption for all taxpayers and a full exemption for taxpayers with less than 50 California…

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Dueling Rent Taxes Come Up before San Francisco Voters in June

TAKEAWAYS It is estimated that about $65 million annually would be collected from the commercial real estate industry under the Housing for All tax. It is estimated that about $150 million annually would be collected from the commercial real estate industry under the Universal Childcare for San Francisco Families tax.…

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California Supreme Court Expands the California Real Estate Transfer Tax to Entity Transfers that Cause Property Tax Re-Assessments under Proposition 13

State and local real estate transfer taxes have become larger planning concerns for investors in U.S. real property, particularly in gateway cities like New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco. This article by colleagues Craig A. Becker, Richard E. Nielsen, Breann E. Robowski and  Andrew J. Weiner describes a recent expansion…

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How States Are Trying New Strategies To Collect Sales Tax

(This article originally was published by Law360 on October 10, 2017.) States historically have had one major impediment to their ability to collect sales tax—the decision in Quill Corporation v. North Dakota to uphold a physical presence test standard for determining nexus.[1] Since the Quill decision, states have applied various…

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Many Questions Unanswered After California’s Tax Shakeup

(This article originally was published by Law360 on October 7, 2017.) On Sept. 16, 2017, California Governor Jerry Brown signed Assembly Bill (A.B.) 131 into law,[1] which takes effect immediately and makes various changes to the Taxpayer Transparency and Fairness Act of 2017 enacted on June 27, 2017.[2] The Act…

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Blazing a Trail for More Local Taxes by Ballot Initiative

(This article originally was published by Law360 on September 7, 2017.) On Aug. 28, 2017, in California Cannabis Coalition v. City of Upland, the California Supreme Court held local taxes imposed by taxpayers via initiative are subject to less stringent requirements than taxes imposed by local governments pursuant to Proposition…

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California Supreme Court Decision Changes the Transfer Tax World

TAKEAWAYS The California Supreme Court’s Ardmore decision concludes counties and cities are permitted to impose transfer tax on entity transfers that result in R&TC §§ 64(c) or 64(d) changes in ownership. Litigation over how to implement this taxation is a certainty. In 926 North Ardmore Avenue LLC v. County of…

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Imposing Documentary Transfer Taxes in California After Ardmore

(This article originally was published by Law360 on July 7, 2016.) Rarely does a subject as mundane as a documentary transfer tax become worthy of its own article. However, the June 29, 2017, decision of the California Supreme Court in 926 North Ardmore Avenue LLC v. County of Los Angeles…

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Some Observations on Gross Receipts Taxes

The majority of states impose a form of a corporate income tax. However, currently five states—Delaware, Ohio, Nevada, Texas and Washington—impose a broad-based, statewide corporate gross receipts tax. The most recent addition to that list is Nevada, which in its 2015 Legislative Session enacted a new Commerce Tax that is…