Random Thoughts

[SectorZ]

I might not have been clear enough (although you do seem to have deleted what caused me to make this clarification). It checks for 60 days of use to consider it occupied, not 60 days of non-use to consider it unoccupied.

Your honor, I'd like my house back, apologies I live alone and was in the hospital and rehab for three months after a bad accident.

If it were me (and was also wife-less), would my two cats count as occupying it?

[CtrlAltDel]

How would life in the USofA change if someone with standing sues and gets the USSupremes to overturn their 1926 ruling in the case of 'Ambler Realty Company v. the City of Euclid, Ohio', which legalized municipal land use zoning nationwide?

It would make everywhere more like Houston.

[JayhawkCO]

I might not have been clear enough (although you do seem to have deleted what caused me to make this clarification). It checks for 60 days of use to consider it occupied, not 60 days of non-use to consider it unoccupied.

Your honor, I'd like my house back, apologies I live alone and was in the hospital and rehab for three months after a bad accident.

If it were me (and was also wife-less), would my two cats count as occupying it?

I think you're still reading him wrong. Even if you were in the hospital for 3 months, there would still be 60 days of occupancy during the year.

[ZLoth]

Finding out that my local library offers:

• Overdrive for audiobooks, ebooks, and emagazines
• Hoopla for audiobooks, ebooks, emagazines, movies, television, and music
• Kanopy video streaming service

The best part is that it's "free" as part of a "free" library service... paid through my property tax dollars. The availability of some recent titles may be limited (use wait lists), but if your local library subscribes to these services, then all you need is a library card, and then you can check out the titles from home or on your mobile device.

[ZLoth]

The normal IRS standard of a house being used as a principal residence is 2 out of the past 5 years.  There are also state standards, many of which require a residence to be lived in for 183 days out of a day to be considered a primary home.  Along with tax purposes, this includes voting rights for the state.

Proof of a primary home includes bills with the occupant's name and address, a driver's license with the address, or a voter registration card.  Other receipts showing the person has lived there also can support the number of days one has lived in a home.

The California Franchise Tax Board, being the every-hungry entity for tax dollars, has specific codes in determining your "domicile" (primary residence) for tax purposes, and even has FTB publication 1031 for determining residency status.

All this shows that you need to have the proper legal planning documents including a Power of Attorney for unusual circumstances including being in a hospital for three months. Also, it helps to have some well-trusted friends and neighbors.

[SectorZ]

I might not have been clear enough (although you do seem to have deleted what caused me to make this clarification). It checks for 60 days of use to consider it occupied, not 60 days of non-use to consider it unoccupied.

Your honor, I'd like my house back, apologies I live alone and was in the hospital and rehab for three months after a bad accident.

If it were me (and was also wife-less), would my two cats count as occupying it?

I think you're still reading him wrong. Even if you were in the hospital for 3 months, there would still be 60 days of occupancy during the year.

OK 10 months. Still possible.

[Scott5114]

How do you establish whether it's been used?  Send the Housing Police around to every house every week and see if it looks vacant?

Who else is going to enforce bedtimes and whether they really brushed their own teeth?

I mean, the cops should probably look into it if there's some bandit going around brushing other people's teeth.

[Max Rockatansky]

The concept of "Dental Police" seems like a missed marketing opportunity.

[kkt]

Much of what zoning does could be done by covenants instead, but a sudden decision eliminating zoning would cause a crisis, because a restrictive covenant would probably have to be purchased by the city, county, or state, rather than just imposed.

[vdeane]

There are other planning tools - site plan review, form-based code, etc.  Even Houston isn't a free for all.

[Scott5114]

Much of what zoning does could be done by covenants instead, but a sudden decision eliminating zoning would cause a crisis, because a restrictive covenant would probably have to be purchased by the city, county, or state, rather than just imposed.

Covenants kind of ick me, since at least if you don't like your zoning you can apply to get it changed, or apply for a variance. I don't know what, if any, recourse there is against a covenant on your property that you don't like.

[kkt]

Yeah.  Permanence is sort of the point though.  Buy a house in this subdivision and you can be sure no one will ever build a 10-story tower south of you putting your house and garden in permanent shade...

[formulanone]

The concept of "Dental Police" seems like a missed marketing opportunity.

The Crest Team shall avail the cavity creeps.

[Scott5114]

Yeah.  Permanence is sort of the point though.  Buy a house in this subdivision and you can be sure no one will ever build a 10-story tower south of you putting your house and garden in permanent shade...

The flip side of that is that, because they're entrenched, you can get saddled with ones that don't make any sense because they were written for a time long past. The obvious example are covenants disallowing you from selling the house to people of certain races (though those are obviously illegal to enforce, they're still technically on the title to the house). The house I'm selling has a covenant on it that, if read literally when they talk about "business activity", would preclude work-from-home arrangements (which obviously weren't something the people who built the house in 1976 could contemplate).

[kurumi]

A company could build a 20 story commercial high rise next to a residential house.

A strip club could be built next to a playground.

A prison could be built next to a church.

A chemical plant could be built next to a farm.

Take any of the above 10, and put it next to any of the remaining 9.  Many of those combinations would be no good.

Which metro area comes closest to filling out that bingo card?

[Max Rockatansky]

If there was a chemical plant next to a house I lived at I would just say I lived at "Chemical Plant Zone."

[mgk920]

IMHO, issues relating to nuisances could still be enforced.  However, I do see a mismatch between zoning as it is currently practiced and the 'taking' tenets of the 5th Amendment. Also remember that the 'Ambler' ruling from a century ago was 6-3 and there were non-legal personal opinions expressed by the prevailing justices in the decision.

Mike

[1995hoo]

If there was a chemical plant next to a house I lived at I would just say I lived at "Chemical Plant Zone."

This homeowner along the former route of VA-123 had a sense of humor about living across the street from the Lorton Reformatory. The sign is gone because the prison closed.

[vdeane]

Yeah.  Permanence is sort of the point though.  Buy a house in this subdivision and you can be sure no one will ever build a 10-story tower south of you putting your house and garden in permanent shade...

The flip side of that is that, because they're entrenched, you can get saddled with ones that don't make any sense because they were written for a time long past. The obvious example are covenants disallowing you from selling the house to people of certain races (though those are obviously illegal to enforce, they're still technically on the title to the house). The house I'm selling has a covenant on it that, if read literally when they talk about "business activity", would preclude work-from-home arrangements (which obviously weren't something the people who built the house in 1976 could contemplate).

On the other hand, a covenant sounds like some deal with demons or a magically binding contract written in blood or something a lot more exciting than a typical real estate transaction.