I bought my house on the Peninsula during the downturn, and now the value is up over $1mil. As far as I understand, if I were to sell then only the first $500k of that (if married) would be tax free, even if I used all of the money to buy another house. Is that true?
Should I have sold when the price was up only $500k and bought something else, to “reset” the baseline? However, then my property taxes would go way up.
It seems the only solution to keep my property taxes low and avoid capital gains tax is to never sell. Perhaps this is why there are barely any houses for sale.
You can take a HELOC to finance your next house. I would probably never sell if i have a house in bay area, and keep accumulate. That’s my plan anyway.
My understanding is that there is a legislation going through Sacramento now that would allow one to transfer one’s property tax rate of resident city/county to anywhere in CA. Currently, you can only transfer to certain cities/counties.
Never look back at what you coulda.woulda done. Who knows what might have happened. The fact is your place has appreciated and so be grateful for that.