Hello everyone and Welcome to another
episode of Selling Greenville your
favorite real estate podcast here in the
upstate of South Carolina I am your host
as always Stan McCune realtor right here in
the greater Greenville area and just a
reminder as always you can find all my
contact information in the show notes if
you need to reach out to me for any of
your real estate needs or just discuss
the Pod or whatever the case may be
that's how you can reach me and as well
just a reminder please subscribe to
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review I would appreciate all of that we
have you know I was looking recently
that this podcast is like ranked number
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something to that effect it's hard to
actually track that kind of stuff but
but anyway we don't have the ratings or
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getting that many lessons so I would
appreciate if you're a listener that you
please go ahead and leave a rating leave
a review that would really go a long
way for me and for the pot I'd
appreciate that today we're going to
be talking about what is happening in
the state and local government because
you may know that this is a very very
big year for the political scene the
local political scene here in Greenville
we have a lot of Elections happening
this year in fact we've already had one
we had a special election
primary that happened a few weeks ago in
Greer and there's going to be a whole
lot more coming here in in the upcoming
in in the future and these elections
are extremely important we had an
election last last time around which
I'm trying to think I think it was a
couple of years ago is the one that I'm
thinking of that ended up being
decided by I believe it was four votes
this was a County Council election four
votes decided it and guess what the
person that won has done done some
very controversial things
and for the most part I haven't heard
a lot of good things about it I'm going
to be very careful with with what I say
here because last time around that we
had elections I endorsed some people and
some of those people I regret endorsing
and I you know would not endorse them
the second time around so I'm probably
not going to do endorsements unless I
have a really strong opinion and I don't
have that yet for most of the people
running so we're going to keep this
on a higher level but I just want you
guys to to start thinking in your mind
these County Council these state house
you know representative positions
candidates that these people are
running for these are very very
important these directly impact you in a
lot of ways more than what your state
senator or your State or sorry your
Federal Representatives your
legislator on the federal level and
whatnot these tend to be the people that
directly impact you the most because
they are your state and local officials
and and yet in spite of that a lot of
people tend to get more excited about
presidential elections about Federal
elections those types of things what
happens in Washington DC does obviously
impact you but what happens in Columbia
South Carolina impacts you usually
more quickly and in more direct ways
than what happens in DC okay with all of
that in mind here's where I want to take
this podcast right now because this
episode specifically because like I said
I'm not going to be making indorsements
or not going to be talking about
specific candidates here what I want
to talk about is kind of what the state
and local candidates and officials that
I have spoken to so far are thinking
about when it comes to real estate where
their heads space is when it comes to
real estate concerns either directly or
indirectly within within the upstate
now you might be thinking how do I know
this where do I where do I have this
Insider information well I'm a member
of the realtor realtor political action
committee and
rpac which is obviously the
abbreviation for it is a group that's
designed designed to help promote
development fair housing affordable
housing anything related private
property ownership anything related to
housing our Pac we try to support that
and part of how we try to support that
is when there are candidates for
elections when there are elections
coming up we actually interview as many
candidates as we can basically any
candidates that will sign up for an
interview we reach out to all of them if
they agree to an interview we interview
them and as part of that interview
process we determine whether we're going
to support and endorse them and usually
we take some time to make sure that
they understand what issues are
important to us because those that at
the end of the day we represent about
4,000 members the the realtor political
action committee does we have 4,000
roughly speaking realtors in the upstate
and so that's a that's a big group
in comparison to some of the other
Consolidated groups that they're talking
to in the upstate now to clarify one
thing because I have gotten this
question before I don't do lobbying okay
and and those of us the realtors in
there that are part of the of the pack
we don't do lobbying that's not part
of being on the realtor political action
committee now does the Realtor
Association do lobbying yes they have
lobbyists that is not what I'm doing
okay so just to be clear on that because
some people might get triggered by the
idea of me being a part of the realtor a
part of a political action committee
but but that's not what my role is
that's not anything that I'm doing in
this so in election years as I said
we talk to candidates and support those
we think will do things that will help
the housing generally speaking the
housing market in Greenville this is a
nonpartisan
committee we don't we're not you know
endorsing inherently one party versus
another it's just talking about housing
that's the important thing now all of
the PE people and I've the past week
I've
interviewed as part of the committee
several people running for office all
of them were either re running for
Greenville County Council or running for
state house so that's important to keep
in mind as I discuss you know what
issues we were talking about so what are
the candidates at least the ones that
I've spoken to so far talking about
specifically from a real estate
standpoint and what should you be
thinking about when assessing who to
vote for again these issues are
really really important and these are
the things that that these candidates
are bringing up because their
constituents or their potential
constituents are bringing them up to
them
first and foremost I mean what we heard
from almost everyone as like a primary
concern in in many cases the number one
concern was
infrastructure and how to pay for it and
this is one of those indirect things
with regard to real estate because the
how to pay for it bit is a very
important detail right so here's what we
keep seeing happening we need to build
more houses we've talked about this
before we have very low inventory the
only way that we ease inventory is by
building more houses it it's literally
that simple infrastructure though is
has to be part of that right there has
to be Road widening there has to be
expansion of utilities sewer water
things like that and who pays for that
is a and how that happens is a major
part of this is that a fee that should
get passed on to the developers that
would be kind of a more libertarian type
of approach and those of you who know
me know that I lean more libertarian but
from a housing
perspective most Realtors would be
against what we call impact fees fees
that developers have to pay in order to
bring in this additional infrastructure
there's a logic behind it the the
logic behind it is that if you have
let's say an area that has 5,000 homes
in it and and a developer comes in and
says hey I want to build 200 homes you
know in this area why are they having to
shoulder all of the burden to widen the
roads to to you know do all these
different things repave areas to help
the entire area when they're only adding
to the homes by a fraction of an amount
in comparison to a small fraction in
comparison to what the other homes in
that area consists
of so that's that's a big point of
debate the like it or not the realtor
political action committee in the past
has has encouraged increasing gas
taxes in order to help with the road
situation here in the the state I
don't know that that's going to be very
popular for improving this in in the
future because of of how high you know
gas prices are last time we had a gas
tax increase it was when gas prices were
very very low they kind of took
advantage of that and you know here we
are now that said South Carolina does
have pretty low gas taxes in comparison
to the rest of the US so that's going to
be a big debate that we probably here
happen after the after the midterms
they're going to have to decide okay are
we going to increase gases gas taxes
rather in order to try to help the
infrastructure specifically the road
situation here in the state of South
Carolina but right
now probably the number one concern I
heard from people running for County
Council for people running for State
House is the concern for infrastructure
and who's going to pay pay for it that's
going to be a major Battleground cuz
and and you know part of this too is you
have some areas some very rural areas
that are just getting neglected and
that's not surprising where do you think
that money is going to to tend to flow
to it's going to tend to flow to those
more urban areas that have more people
in them so you know if you have roads
that are getting just more traffic on
them those tend to be the priority but
then then you've got these rural areas
and and they are still growing as
well where what happens when their roads
are just completely crumbling how do you
handle that and you've got developers
wanting to build out there and those
are areas that are are growing and and
are expanding but if you've got
crumbling infrastructure out there
that's a big problem so you've got some
people fighting for their District
seeing like hey out in Pickins County we
have some pretty dangerous and narrow
roads with a lot of potholes around here
what do we do about that and when are
we going to actually see some money out
there versus going you know to the the
more densely populated areas of
Greenville County so all of those
things are are are being debated
right now and our and our major talking
points for those running this year
for the various positions that
that are open this second thing on
my list here and and the rest of these
aren't necessarily in any particular
order that infrastructure one was was
one for a reason but the next one
that gets that got brought up honestly a
lot we didn't for with some candidates
we had to bring it up and and you
know asked them if it was important to
them a lot of them this is just a
natural part of their platform was
housing
affordability now and and that's music
to everyone's ears right we all want
housing housing has gotten so
unaffordable in the upstate we need
it to be more affordable and I've I've
discussed this a lot of times in my
podcast now for what most of the of
these
candidates what most of them meant when
they talked about housing affordability
was basically finding developers who
would incorporate affordable housing
into their developments and then
basically incentivizing them on a
government level and maybe on a
public private partnership level to
do that so that's the that was the
idea that we heard the most was to when
there are new developments coming into
town that they need to dedicate a
portion of that development to quote
unquote affordable housing which can
mean a few different things that can
mean that that part of the
development has to be basically
offered for cheaper for people to
purchase but most frequently what that
means is that as developers are
building you know rental units
apartments and
whatnot that they have committed to
setting aside a large portion of those
rental units to be affordable by various
metrics and so that's something that
is on the front of mind for a lot of
these candidates those who are
incumbents those who are already in
office are already in the council and
are running again they generally
understand that there needs to be more
development in general not just
affordable units the the focus on the
affordable units was generally by people
who aren't
incumbents which Cuts both ways right
the incumbents need to understand that
there that there may be a need for
developers to just bring in affordable
housing not just to develop more and on
the flip side those who are running for
the first time or are are attempting to
win for the first time they need to
understand that affordability on the
whole happens when there's more
Supply and and so you don't just
impact affordability by focusing on
affordable housing you also have to to
talk about develop to scale and
driving you know maybe not driving down
the price of housing but but making it
to where there's more opportunities for
people to buy which then as Supply
increases that helps to make things more
affordable just in
general however obviously this can
then be at odds with the infrastructure
concern right if you're building if
you're developing more then that takes
us back to the infrastructure concern so
there is really a tug OFW War here
between the infrastructure concern and
the housing affordability concern
because then you run into if you have a
developer that's that's developing
affordable housing which generally
speaking they're not going to make as
much money doing that as they would
just developing not affordable housing
what what one candidate called market
rate housing they're going to make
more money building market rate housing
than affordable housing
that that's obvious but then if they're
building the affordable housing and then
they're also responsible for paying for
the infrastructure you know widening
roads and doing things like that now
so combining both of those concerns the
infrastructure concern with the housing
affordability concern now you're kind of
squeezing the developers in both
directions and that might result in
no development so these candidates
they're going to have to they're
going to have to figure this out County
Council is going to have to figure this
out our state reps are going to have
to to figure this out as well there
there's a lot of different opinions and
different approaches to be taken and
hopefully they are able to make some
some steps in the right direction in
the upcoming months when it and and
years when we have these elections
and then when they step into office
or step into the council all of this
leads to the matter of growth another
buzzword that we heard a lot which it's
an important word it's not just a
buzzword growth U which means a lot of
different things but on the most basic
level it means population growth because
that's what we're seeing Greenville
County is supposed to grow in population
by another 200 to
250,000 people roughly speaking in
the next 10 years is my understanding
and
so that's a lot of people you know I
haven't looked at it recently but I
think Greenville County right now is in
the the maybe 600,000 person range so
we're talking about you know maybe
increasing that by a third that's a
massive increase and there's a lot that
has to be done over the next 10 years to
to prepare for that which is why the
infrastructure concern is a legitimate
concern but we
also as you have that many people coming
in where are they going to live they
have to live somewhere and so every
District wants growth to slow in their
District right nobody you know out in
Pickin County where they have all
that you know Farmland everyone has
you know several Acres that they live on
generally speaking nobody wants a big
development to go up next to them they
all want that development to go you know
several miles away or to a different
District or or what have you and
several people that we interviewed
insinuated that they they they came
right out and said that they want the
other districts to shoulder the
growth responsibility they don't want
growth in their District well this is
a problem right this is this is not
going to help generally speaking the
the housing affordability
aspect of of this
discussion but as well you know those
people that want growth they have to
have houses in order to to grow in order
to just not get stagnant right they they
want growth but they don't want growth a
lot of these people in office and a lot
of these candidates they they want you
know you know the downtown areas to be
nicer for there to be more green space
for there' be more businesses for there
to be better grocery stores all these
things but they don't want houses to
accompany all of those things well what
happens if you build all of those things
again not trying to to pick on Pickins
County but you've got all of those
things people wanting all of those
things in Pickins County but are they
where are they supposed to live are they
supposed to commute from Greenville to
go out to Pickins why not build houses
in Pickins to support that growth so
again there's a lot of push and pull
when it comes to all these different
things that quite frankly a lot of
these candidates don't fully understand
you have to you'll have to do your
research when you find out who you're
you're going to be voting for in the
upcoming elections we got primaries
first and then the general do your
research and and hear what their
platforms are and whether those
platforms are even reasonable
I I will say I was impressed that one
candidate that we interviewed only one
out of many really understood that
his district desperately needed more
housing in general that it wasn't just
affordable housing that they needed more
housing specifically for one reason this
person has is a district that covers
that Donaldson Center area of Greenville
and those of you that know that area
know that there's really no grocery
store anywhere near there and that's a
major problem particularly for those who
do have lower income and and perhaps
don't have reliable transportation if
they have to drive 20 25 minutes to a
grocery store that's a big deal as
opposed to maybe being able to take some
public transportation or or maybe being
able to even afford to Uber or or maybe
even be able to walk or ride a bike bike
so for a long time we've had people
trying to push to get grocery stores in
that area but there's a major problem
the the grocery stores either want the
general income level of that District
of that area to be higher or they want
the population to be higher in order for
them to to be able to to put a
grocery store they have very strict
metrics by which they determine where
they put a a new grocery store and so
there was one candidate that that is
attempting to represent that area that
realized we just need we need more
houses in this area so that we can
potentially help the entire area with
more commercial development specifically
having at least one grocery store in
the
area so so that was interesting to
see another Topic in the real estate
discussion that got brought up a lot
not not as much as as these others but
it got brought up a decent amount was
the issue of
gentrification and this was an
interesting one several candidates have
an interest and seeing people who get
pushed out of a community due to
gentrification or or out of their house
because they can no longer afford to
keep up with it the area has gentrified
so they have to sell they're they're
kind of pushed into that option or
perhaps they're on a fixed income and as
areas get gentrified they get reassessed
by the county and then their property
taxes go up and now they can't even
afford their property taxes there are
several candidates that want to there to
be a pathway for these people to be able
to go back into those communities
this is going to be a an interesting
discussion and it it's a tricky one as
well and we didn't get into specifics on
this obviously our interviews could only
go so long but but there was one
candidate in particular that this is a
very major part of his
platform and the the only thing that I
can figure that he's thinking is if
people are pushed out of a house that
they have somewhere that they can go
that they can rent that would be
affordable which probably wouldn't be a
house it would probably be an apartment
or a condo or something like that but
what whatever the case may be we all
recognize that and I've talked about
this many times before gentrification
Cuts both ways it does kick people out
of a community that they've perhaps been
in for a very very long time but it
also helps people's home values to go up
if we could find a way to keep
people's home values going up and still
allow people to to stay within their
communities they they won't be able to
necessarily stay within their house
because of the things that I just that I
just brought up but if they have if
they're forced into a position where
they have to sell they they have options
where they don't have to completely just
move to you know from Greenville and
down to Fountain in or something drastic
like that so that was an issue that
got brought up a lot we're going to be
hearing more and more about this as the
hous housing affordability goes down
and down and and this has been this has
been kind of one of those topics that a
lot of people have tried to avoid for
years and years is the topic of
gentrification and we're going to see
this becoming a bigger talking point
because it's a it's a bigger issue it's
something that is increasingly needing
to be discussed and so that that will be
interesting to see how the different
candidates discuss that topic in these
upcoming
elections last but not least taxes
got brought up and this gets
brought up more for those running for
the State House than those running for
for County Council technically the
county does collect the tax but
there's a lot of State influence in
terms of of what taxes actually what is
actually in those property taxes and and
how the rates get determined and and
various things like that that it it's a
mixture right the county influen it some
the state INF influences it some but
generally speaking when it came to the
tax discussion because the
state ultimately controls the entire tax
code and you can't really overhaul
property taxes in any meaningful way
without overhauling the entire tax code
this discussion got brought up much more
with those running for state house
and those running for County Council
and and it got brought up enough to
Warrant a discussion here now for the
most part I think that most think that
property taxes are where they need to be
I've mentioned this before but South
Carolina has one of the lowest owner
occupied tax rates in the US and one of
the highest non-owner occupied tax rates
in the US and I had to remind a few
of these candidates as they talked about
issues of gentrification and whatnot
and issues of of lack of affordable
rental properties that rents
ballooning in Greenville are largely due
to property taxes going up and how
severely landlords are penalized here in
in the state of South Carolina so
that was something I made sure to point
out to them there's no easy fix for that
because there's so much the the tax
code is relying so much on those
landlords and on Commercial properties
in order to to pay the bills and I
mentioned before that some of the
candidates who are more concerned about
about affordable housing we're concerned
with the fact that owner occupied tax
rates or or really the tax
assessments are the are the proper way
of saying that the owner occupied taxes
due to higher tax assessments are going
up and hurting people on a fixed income
and with the result that some people
are getting kicked out of homes that
they don't even have a mortgage on that
they have owned for 30 40 years because
they can no longer afford their property
taxes
but again as I already said South
Carolina has one of the lowest owner
occupied tax rates in the US and one
candidate mentioned that for every $1
that a homeowner pays on their owner
occupied property they actually get back
statistically A14 cents of services
so they're not paying into the system
what they're getting out it's the
landlords and businesses that are
shouldering the burden for everyone else
in the state basically and and
so the end result of that is that
there's a lot more encouragement for
then commercial development than there
is for residential which as a realtor
I'm okay with commercial development but
not at the expense of housing
obviously the idea of changing the
property tax code is something that
Columbia has Tau talked about this is
something our governor has talked about
this is something that our legislators
have discussed
and from a real estate standpoint
Realtors would generally like things to
be a little bit more Equitable that we
don't like the fact that the rental
property tax rate is so high why are why
are Mom and popop landlords paying the
same amount as a major commercial
Enterprise is paying in in property
taxes that doesn't seem fair
and so that's something that's being
discussed and that that's a big deal
that's hurting again the housing
affordability for when it comes to
rental properties but in order for
that to be changed in any meaningful way
again you have to change the entire tax
code and and that's going to be
daunting I I don't see how we're going
to do that there's a lot of division
right now in
Colombia and getting the getting the
the tax code written to make the
property tax situation better for for
landlords that's going to be tough that
that's that's going to be a tough sell
for a lot of people a lot of people
don't like landlords they they have this
uh
misconception that landlords are all
these big you know institutionalized
companies that are just raking in
tons and tons of money they don't have
the the concept of most landlords 90% of
landlords are just Mom and Pop
landlords in that only own you know one
2 3 four units but but the reality is
the public perception it's really hard
to change that so we'll have to see
where things go with that but that was
the the tax situation the property tax
situation specifically was brought up by
by multiple candidates some that that
recognized that there are issues when it
comes to that some that that didn't
some that are just running on a just
low tax lower tax platform in general
they just want to see all the taxes get
lowered they think that our state
government is too big so there's a
lot of varying opinions when it comes to
this but I encourage all of you when the
time comes to vote look at what these
people are campaigning what platforms
they're Campa campaigning on there are
some like I said some very important
elections coming up the chairman of
County Council has an has a
reelection going on here and he has
several people running against him
that's a very important election to
watch go through the new go through the
news and and read about some of the
things that the Greenville County
Council chairman has been doing the
past year I think that will be pretty
eye opening for a lot of you and
again that's not me saying to vote for
him or not to vote for him but it's
important that you know what's actually
happening and I will probably have
more information as we get through the
primary season as we interview more
people for the general election but
for right now that is what I'm seeing
those are the real estate related
concerns that I'm seeing locally and
and and it's good to see it's good to
see that they aren't just concerned
about about things that aren't
related to housing because we know that
there are these infrastructure concerns
that that we do have housing
affordability concerns that we do have
gentrification concerns that we do have
tax code concerns so it's good that
these candidates are recognizing that
and now we just need to get the right
people in there with the right Solutions
and and hopefully we can do that I
appreciate you guys for listening all my
contact information is in the show notes
as always rate review subscribe to the
show and we'll talk again next week
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