[Anon4Now]

If the property is devalued, the property taxes lower accordingly. Portland, Oregon has been facing this problem recently. The devaluations caused the tax revenues for the city to drop, which in turn has caused budget issues.

For example, "Big Pink" is an office tower in downtown Portland. It's last sale was for about $370 million. Out of desperation in a saturated market, the owners sold it last year for about $45 million. No one - the owners, the city, or the citizens - wants to have the vicious downturn of values, and there is no easy solution. Adding a vacancy tax just exacerbates the problem.

[Ekaros]

As citizen I might prefer downturn of values. At least in medium term. Yes there is lot less tax income. But on other hand lowering values would mean lower rents which would mean lower overheads and potentially cheaper prices or more business being viable.

[Anon4Now]

I'm with you there, but as far as I can tell, it hasn't impacted residential prices.

[nairboon]

Adding taxes in a downturn obviously adds additional friction. One might ask, what happened to the tax revenue of that $370M transaction, where is it now when the city needs it.

[Anon4Now]

It's gone. So are many services that the city provided.

[bsder]

> Adding a vacancy tax just exacerbates the problem.

The point of the vacancy tax is also to prevent the over speculation before it happens. If the operators know that they are looking at having to cough up more cash than they expect in the future, they might reign in the rampant real estate speculation. If the bank knows that they might have to start coughing up cash, they'll be more inclined to actually just drop the property into bankruptcy.