Preserving the CAMPS
 

Is there, or did anyone ever try, to provide incentives for new owners NOT to try to maximize the FAR on a site?

What is "FAR?"

What is “FAR”?

When the next generation sells, the intent is to get max $$, not to be conservationists.

Believe it’s Floor Area Ratio, a measure of a project’s density. Max FAR is often noted In Zoning requirements.

Why and how?

It makes no sense for towns to limit FAR when it comes to waterfront & island property. Higher the square footage = higher assessed value = more tax $$$! No need to leave those tax dollars on the table....

Woodsy

Because, chances are those tax dollars come from out of state!


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The State of NH does not care where the tax dollars come from! They just want the $$$!

I do find it funny when out of state property owners complain about their tax bill. It was the wealthy out of state property owners who long ago priced NH folks off the lake.... it will be a wealthy out of state property owner who will get priced out by a wealthier out of state property owner. It is an endless cycle.

Woodsy

Where do they come from?
 

You'd be surprised where some of these folks come from. I know at least three people on Welch Island whose year round home is in... drumbeat...wait for it...

Gilford.
One from Alton, others from as far away as Amherst, NH.
Others on bridged islands, are from Florida. They changed their legal address to escape NH income tax (Interest and Dividends, soon to be Capital Gains if the Dems can override Gov. Sununu's expected veto.)

And you can add one from Little Bear (non-bridged island) to the ranks of those who will be changing their legal residence to Florida when the Demon-Rats override the Gov's veto.

There are a lot worse states than NH, tax wise, to be a legal resident in.

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Out of staters don’t complain about their tax bill, they complain about getting little if any services for the taxes they pay.


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A recent USA Today study listed NH as the 3rd highest effective property tax rate in the country.

3. New Hampshire
• Effective property tax rate: 1.99 percent
• Median home value: $263,600 (14th highest)
• Per capita property taxes: $3,054.30 (2nd highest)
• Median household income: $73,381 (6th highest)


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In fairness, a 2018 study by them also listed NH as the 7th lowest overall taxes in the country.

7. New Hampshire

Taxes paid as pct. of income: 7.9%

Income per capita: $55,954 (7th highest)

Income tax collections per capita: $72 (9th lowest)

Property tax collections per capita: $2,861 (2nd highest)

General sales tax collections per capita: $0 (tied — the lowest)


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Yes but that's just property taxes. The overall tax burden is is one of the lowest. No sales tax, no income tax, no excise tax and gas tax is much lower than all the other New England states.
Ma collects a ton of money in sales tax. I have a small business and I send them 50K a year in collected sales tax. That's chump change compared to what they collect from the big businesses.

Which, in effect, is a complaint about the tax bill.

Never complain about the tax bill for my island property. In fact, pay it in advance. Do worry however that, in the case of a fire, the fire boat will arrive in time to only save the neighbors house from burning down.


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I see tax collected on my NH vehicle registrations. This, in my view, is equivalent to the excise tax you reference.

But NH does have it's own kind of income tax for businesses and professionals. The Business Profits Tax and the Business Enterprise Tax are essentially that, they're just not called that.

The Moultonborough property tax rate is $.772, which is a fraction of the state average and less than a third of the rate in high tax towns in NH.

NH has personal taxes for those who save or invest! If you have enough income on a 1099 or dividends you may be taxed. Many of the ones effected are retirees and elderly who saved or invested successfully.

Resident individuals, partnerships, and fiduciaries earning interest and dividend taxable income of more than $2,400 annually ( $4,800 for joint filers).

Yes, Interest and Dividends Tax. NH doesn't have an "income tax" but has all kinds of income taxes.

Yes the state finds all kinds of ways to tax you. We have been on the lake for over 50 years in one of the original homes. It is not been easy for my family to keep it going with the taxes each year going up and the assessments based on fairy tale evaluations. We are originally from Ohio but my parents were in New Hampshire at camps when they were little and loved it. We would drive up every summer, now we try to come up every chance we get. I have lived all over the country and there is no lake I have ever been to like Winnipesaukee, the trick is to try and hang on to what we have!

More on that Int/Div tax is from the state's site:

"Resident individuals, partnerships, and fiduciaries earning interest and dividend taxable income of more than $2,400 annually ( $4,800 for joint filers). In addition, the following exemptions may also apply: 1) a $1,200 exemption is available for residents who are 65 years of age or older; 2) a $1,200 exemption is available for residents who are blind regardless of their age; and 3) a $1,200 exemption is available to disabled individuals who are unable to work, provided they have not reached their 65th birthday."

Thus I would think that nearly all NH retirees would be over 65 and the total exemption for couple would be $7200.

Repeal or add more?
 

For the last several sessions, Republicans have filed bills to repeal the I & D tax. If you have a NH Trust, the trust does not have to pay the tax, and you do not have to be a NH resident to move your money here. One example, when the law changed, Cambridge Trust opened an office in Manchester, then Portsmouth, and Concord. Starting from scratch, so to speak, they recently passed the $1 billion mark for assets under management.
Now, instead of building on this success, the legislative majority has filed bills to repeal the reductions in BET/BPT, and they want to add Capital Gains to the I & T tax. May your veto pen never run out of ink, Governor Sununu.

Wow did this thread go down hill fast.

Screw the tax arguments. Lets talk about the camps themselves. One of the issues is as people try to update there property you reach a point where you have to make investments. Septic Systems wells etc. Some people feel that the cost of this is not a big deal and would rather keep there camps. While others feel if they are going to spend 30K for a septic installation, and 10K for a well, and have to take a loan, why not take a bigger plunge and improve the camp... more often then not it is cheaper to demo what is there and start over, and things spiral from there... People building to suit what they can afford, and not what the need.....

The only way to keep camps camps, is for them to stay with the original family that has an emotion tie to the camp... however for many the cost of keeping the camp puts to much of strain on them financially. Some times it is a strain emotionally (I fall into this catagory)... both of which bring you to the conclusion that it might be time to move on....

Also - once you start in on doing needed repair work or even just updating sometimes the older places are simply not worth dumping money into. Shoddy construction can be difficult and expensive to overcome. It gets even more complicated when in order to do an improvement requires that a portion of or the entire building be brought up to code. That in and of itself can be cost prohibitive. Doesn't mean that it justifies what many of these places are turning into. Modest is not a typical term used to describes new mainland waterfront construction these days!

That said and I fall into this category myself, many island places are being tastefully fixed up and not destroyed. I guess it all comes down to whether or not you have something decent to start with.