Epic Real Estate Investing - The Truth About All the Weird Property Tax Reform

Episode Date: October 3, 2025

Seven states just admitted they can’t keep taxing your home the same way. This episode's sponsor: https://ridgelendinggroup.com/ Your new biggest fan, Matt P.S. Hey, if any of this stuff resonated with you, I've got a few things that might help: My new newsletter thing - It's called Shadow Capital Brief. Basically, I take all the confusing money news and break it down so you actually know what to do next. 👉 https://ShadowCapitalBrief.com My book - Rich Dad asked me to create a course to go with it. It's everything I wish someone told me before I wasted years figuring this stuff out the hard way. 👉 https://MyEscapeBook.com Our community - It's a bunch of fed-up professionals who got tired of playing by rules that don't work. We're doing creative real estate, AI stuff, alternative investing... you know, actual solutions. 👉 https://TheEscape.club Oh yeah, and if you need passive income without all the guru nonsense... I made this guide 👉 https://FrustratedInvestor.com And if you could use some money for deals, there's this 0% interest thing at 👉 https://LoopholeLending.com that banks really don't want you to know about. Property taxes are exploding across America—and seven states just changed the rules forever. From California’s generational tax traps to North Dakota’s plan to eliminate property taxes completely, these reforms reveal just how broken the system really is. If you own a home—or dream of owning one—this isn’t background noise. It’s your money, your future, and maybe even your ability to stay in your own house. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You've essentially created your own personal federal reserve. You're printing money the same way the government does, except you get to keep the profits. This is the epic real estate podcast, contrarian takes on money, housing, and policy without the guru nonsense. Let's go, let's go, let's go, let's go, let's go, let's go. And look, let's talk about property taxes, that twice a year bill you get that feels less like paying for services and more like a ransom note from your local high school's marching band. It's the subscription fee you pay for the privilege of not having your own home seized by the government. It's supposed to fund schools and roads and firefighters, but it's also a system

so archaic, so bafflingly complex and so fundamentally infuriating, it makes the rules of Scientology look like a straightforward instruction manual for a toaster. And right now, that system is on fire. All across America, people's home values have skyrocketed, which sounds great until the tax bill arrives, and you realize that you're being charged penthouse prices for the same three bedroom ranch house you've lived in for 20 years. The situation has gotten so bad that states are finally being forced to do something,

and doing something has resulted in a chaotic nationwide panic scramble that's part insane. You've got a few different flavors of reform out there. First up, Montana. Montana looked at the system and decided to try something that's either, genuinely revolutionary or was cooked up by a college freshman after their first sociology class. A graduated property tax. Yeah, it's like your income tax, but for the bricks that you live in. The first $400,000 of your home's value is taxed at a tiny 0.76%. But for every dollar over $1.5 million, you pay a whopping 2.2%. It's a tax-the-rich policy, which in Montana probably

just means anyone who owns a ski-in, ski-out yurt with an attached artistical. goat milking station. But that is nothing compared to North Dakota. North Dakota looked at property taxes and said, you know what? Let's just not. They put a measure on the 2024 ballot to eliminate property taxes entirely. Just poof. Gone. Their genius plan was to replace the $3.15 billion at cost to run everything with the state's massive oil revenue. This is the fiscal equivalent of quitting your job to become a professional gambler because you won $50 on a scratcher. It's fiscal policy designed by a guy whose entire personality is a monster truck. It failed, obviously.

Even North Dakotaans thought it was a bit much. But the fact they even tried shows you just how furious people are. But here's what makes this even more insane. While North Dakota was debating whether to just blow up the whole system, their neighbors were getting absolutely crushed. Colorado homeowners saw their property taxes jump 53% since 2019 and Georgia, In Georgia, 52%. In Florida, 38% increased there.

And we're not talking about pocket change here. That's thousands of dollars in new taxes on the exact same house you've been living in for decades. Then you have states that are just making things weirder. Take California, the king of weird, really. Thanks to their Proposition 19, they have perfected the art of generational inequality. It used to be that kids could inherit their parents' home

and their parents' ancient low Prop 13 tax base. Not anymore. Now, if you inherit mom's house and don't immediately move in and declare it your primary residence, your tax bill jumps from $500 a year to $25,000 a year. It's a condolences on your loss. Now get out policy. And it gets even more twisted. The exact same law lets people over the age of 55 sell their house, buy a more expensive

one anywhere in the state, and keep their old tiny tax bill. They can do this three times. Meanwhile, if you inherit your parents' house and don't immediately move in, your tax bill jumps from $500 to $25,000. In cities like Miami, Tampa, and Los Angeles, new homeowners are paying double what their neighbors pay for identical houses, literally the same floor plan, same street, same everything, just because they had the audacity to buy their house five years later instead of inheriting Grandpa's 1978 tax assessment.

So a boomer in Palo Alto can sell their $4 million shack by a $5,000. million dollar beachfront mansion and keep paying property taxes like it's 1978 while the young family who bought their old house is now paying 50 times more for the privilege it's a system actively designed by someone who hates their own grandchildren and speaking of baffling look at Florida their big revolutionary idea tying one of their homestead exemptions to inflation that's it that's the big idea until now their exemption was static meaning as your home value exploded, the tiny bit you got to save didn't. Florida just figured out that money changes value

over time. Congrats. You just discovered the 1970s. Then you have the states that have just given up. Texas is throwing $50 billion at the problem. Their solution is just to jack up the homestead exemption. The bit of your home's value they can't tax from 100,000 to 140,000. It's the political equivalent of your dad being furious about the electricity bill. And instead of turning off any lights, just deciding to pay for it with a credit card he found in the mail and calling it savings. But Ohio. Ohio is my favorite. Ohio discovered that school districts aren't just hoarding money.

They're sitting on cash reserves that have tripled from $3.6 billion in 2012 to $10.5 billion now. That's your property tax money earning interest in their bank accounts while they're out there asking voters for more levy money. It's like your teenager asking for more allowance while hiding a stack of hundies under their mattress. So now the state is passing a law effective in 2006, forcing any district with more than a 40% carryover to give the money back. They are literally having to legislate against prudent saving or gross ineptitude. I honestly can't tell. The point is, the whole system is a teetering jenga tower of desperate fixes, bizarre loopholes, and political handouts. All built on a foundation that's fundamentally insane.

The idea that the better your community gets, the more you should be punishing. for living in it. Your home value goes up. Fantastic. Now you can't afford the taxes to stay there. So what can you do? Honestly, first check your state's new rules because as you can see, they're probably changing them based on a dare. I know Florida's changing constantly. But second, and most importantly, always appeal your property tax assessment. Always. You see, you have a right to challenge what they think your house is worth because the person setting the value might be some guy named Moose who's having a bad day and just give you. Yes. More people win this than you think. So do that. And here's your mic drop fact.

As of 2025, some counties in Pennsylvania haven't reassessed property values since 1972. There are people right now living in mansions and paying property taxes based on valuation set when the Godfather was in theaters. An American Pie was the number one song. And a gallon of gas cost 36 cents. The system isn't just broken. In some places, it's literally a museum exhibit that somehow still sends you a bill twice a year. And look, after all of that, after we've established that the entire system of American property taxation is basically a flaming dumpster fire balanced on a unicycle, I am now apparently contractually obligated to end on a positive note. Fine. If the system is going to punish you for just existing in your own

home, maybe the only way to win the game is to force the game to pay you. That's right. I'm talking about income-producing real estate. Yes, becoming a landlord. Traditionally, the most beloved figure in any community, right after the guy who invented pop-up ads and that pigeon that keeps dive-bombing your car. But here's the thing. In an economy where your savings account is basically a leaky bucket and the stock market is a casino run by toddlers on a sugar high, owning a physical thing that someone pays you to live in, well, it's not the worst idea. It's the least worst idea. It's the but Brussels sprouts of financial planning. You may not love it, but it's probably good for you. Now, obviously, you can't just buy a duplex with the spare change that you found in your couch.

You need a loan. And normally, you'd go to a big bank where you have to fill out a mountain of paperwork and pretend to be best friends with their ridiculous cartoon mascot, like a talking pig or a bear in a hat, all just to beg them to take your money for 30 years. It's a humiliating process. But, and I am a surprised to be saying this as you, are to be hearing it. Our sponsor for today's video, Ridge Lending Group, has a way around that. They have something called a DSCR loan, a debt service coverage ratio loan, which is just a comically robotic sounding name for a very simple idea. They don't really care about your income. They don't care about your tax returns. They care if the property makes enough money to pay for itself.

It's a loan based on the building's merits, not on how well you can beg. It's a show me the money loan. And here's the truly wild part. Their DSCR loans are currently beating the bank's 30-year rates. Yes, they are somehow offering loans for investment properties at rates that are better than what the big, ghoulish banks are offering for the home you actually live in. Which, how is that possible? I don't know. Is it magic? Is it a typo? Is it a clerical error in their favor that they're just running with? Honestly, who cares? It's like finding a loophole in your cell phone contract that gives you free data forever. You don't ask questions.

You just download every season of the Great British Bake Off and you pray they don't notice. So here's the deal. If you've been thinking about this, if you're tired of your rent paying someone else's mortgage, go talk to them. Check out ridglinggroup.com. And honestly, thank them.

Thank them for sponsoring this video because their money pays for all of this. The lights and the graphics and the editor and the extensive and frankly disturbing research into 1970s tax assessments. They pay for that. So go call them. And now that you'll have a place

where you can go get the money, you now need the property. If you've been grinding for deals and coming up empty, you're not alone. That's why we created a way for frustrated investors to finally get cash flowing income property

without the hassle. Go to frustratedinvestor.com. And now, back to the show. And look, we need to talk about inflation. Again, yeah, that inflation, the one that politicians blame for everything, from your $9 box of cereal to their own spectacular, ongoing inability to govern. But here's the thing, it's America's greatest shot at a comeback. But you're still being told that inflation is the monster under the bed, that it's the economic equivalent of finding a scorpion in your shoe. And that the Federal Reserve must fight it.

They must kill it. They must get it back down to the holy sacred 2%. target. But what if I told you that in the time since we last spoke, this argument has gone from interesting to mathematically vital. What if I told you the Fed isn't just wrong? They are actively sabotaging the only escape hatch we have left. Because guess who's back? The one economic force that can actually save us from financial disaster. Because the problem America isn't the inflation. The problem is this, the $37.43 trillion zombie apocalypse. I mean, just a little while ago, the national debt was $33 trillion, which was already a laugh until you cry number.

Well, I updated my notes. As of this month, September 2025, the U.S. national debt is $37 trillion. That is not a number. That is a cry for help written in a font size so large it collapses the universe. It's growing by $5.72 billion per day. We are adding the entire net worth of a new random tech billionaire to the debt every single day. And what are our politicians doing? Well, they just passed the one big beautiful bill act, which adds another $3.4 trillion to the deficit over the next decade.

Because, of course, they did. They are financial arsonists arguing over who gets to hold the gasoline. You cannot pay this. You cannot tax this. You cannot cut spending your way out of this. It is an unkillable 80-story tall Cthulu made of IOUs. But what if you could just shrink it? This is where inflation.

Our problematic superhero comes in. If inflation runs at, say, 4%. That $37.43 trillion debt loses 4% of its real value every year. That is $1.48 trillion in debt vanishing into thin air annually. That's not just helpful in. anymore. That is essential. It's the only mathematically viable path left. So what is our brilliant Federal Reserve doing in the face of this fiscal apocalypse? Are they harnessing this power? Are they guiding it? No, they're fighting it. Inflation is currently 2.9%. It's not 10%, it's not 20%, it's 2.9%.

And the Fed is still in a full-blown panic, obsessed with getting back to their arbitrary 2% target. They just cut rates, a tiny bit, but they are still officially fighting the one thing that can save us. This is insane. This is like your house being on fire, and you have a giant hose full of water, but instead of using it on the fire, the $37 trillion, the Fed is aiming the hose at your lawn, which has already got plenty of water, the 2.9% inflation. They are actively fighting the only cure we have. And it gets worse, because their obsession. has real world consequences. I mean, remember that good news about manufacturing jobs coming back. That reshoring boom? Well, it's slowing down. Projections for new manufacturing jobs in

2025 are declining. The manufacturing sector is literally contracting. Why? Because when the Fed keeps rates high to fight inflation, it makes the U.S. dollar super strong. And when the dollar is strong, And when the dollar is strong, our exports get expensive and foreign goods get cheap. That's right. The Fed's 2% obsession is literally making it harder to make in America. They are killing the manufacturing Renaissance in its crib to worship at the altar of a number that they just pulled out of their hat in the 1990s. Meanwhile, what about you?

The 65% of Americans who own a home are sitting on a winning lottery ticket. their house value goes up and inflation eats their fixed rate mortgage. But the Fed, by trying to crush inflation, is trying to steal that lottery ticket right out of your hand. They are protecting the banks, the creditors, at the expense of the middle class, the debtors. So here's the deal. Our government is a runaway train of debt. Our politicians have proven they will only make it worse. The only thing, the only mathematical force on earth that can shrink that $37.43 trillion monster without destroying the country in a storm of austerity is moderate inflation.

And the Federal Reserve is fighting it. The real villain here isn't 3% inflation. The real villain is the 2% target. So the next time you hear a politician or a financial pundit panicking about 2.9% inflation, you need to ask them, why are you trying to? to stop the only thing that can save us from the $37 trillion debt bomb you and your friends built. And if you still think this is all just crazy talks, I know it probably sounds like it, here's your mic drop fact. After World War II, America's debt to GDP ratio was over 110%.

By 1980, after decades of moderate to high inflation, it was down to just 31%. We didn't pay it back. we inflated it away. It's the only trick we have left. But here's what this means for you. Right now, as you're watching this, you have a choice. You can either be a victim of this system, or you can flip the script and make it work for you. See, while the masses are panicking about inflation eating their savings,

the smart money, the people who actually understand how the game works, they're doing something completely different. They are borrowing, depreciating dollars to buy appreciating assets. They're taking out loans and money that's losing value every single day and using it to purchase income-producing real estate that's growing in value every single year. Think about it. You borrow $300,000 today. Inflation runs at 4%.

In 10 years, that $300,000 debt has done. the purchasing power of about $200,000 in today's money. Meanwhile, that rental property you bought, it's worth $450,000 and thrown off $3,000 a month in cash flow. You've essentially created your own personal federal reserve. You're printing money the same way the government does, except you get to keep the profits. This is how you turn the system that's designed to crush the middle class into your personal wealth building machine. You become the bank. You become the beneficiary of inflation instead of its victim.

But here's the thing, and this is critical. Most people will never do this. It's crazy talk. And they'll keep their money and savings accounts earning 0.5% while inflation eats 3% to 4% of their purchasing power every year, which is crazier. And they'll complain about the system while refusing to learn how it acts.

actually works. The question is, which person are you going to be? The crazy person or the really crazy person? Because if you're sitting there thinking, this makes sense, but, you know, I don't have the time, the knowledge, or the desire to become a real estate mogul. I'm just going to leave my money in the bank because that's so much easier. Well, I've got good news for you. You don't have to do that. Even just one or two turnkey rental properties can completely change your financial trajectory. Properties that are already renovated, already rented, already managed, where you literally just collect the checks while inflation makes your debt disappear. Because the train is leaving the station, and you can either be on it or watch it disappear into the distance. By the time mainstream media

reports the truth, it's already too late. That's why we built the shadow capital brief. To decode money, housing and policy before everyone else. Subscribe today. Shadowcapitalbrief.com. All right, back to the show. And look, we all know that trying to buy a house in America right now feels less like the American dream and more like a competitive blood sport where you're trying to outbid a sentient Excel spreadsheet with the trust fund. You save for a decade. You skip avocado toast. You promise you're first born to a mortgage broker and you still lose a bidding war for a two-bedroom shack that smells like cat's sadness to an all-cash offer from generational wealth LLC. But what if I told you this isn't just your bad luck? What if I told you it's not a crisis, but a plan? They're calling it a

housing reset. That sounds harmless, doesn't it? It sounds like something a helpful IT guy does to your router. But what's happening is less like unplugging it and plugging it back in and more like unplugging your grandma's life support so they can charge their vape. This isn't a reset. It's a robbery and you are the target. So how does this robbery begin? Well, with the government, of course. The Trump administration is apparently considering declaring a national housing emergency, potentially as soon as this fall. Now, you might think, great, it is an emergency. Are they going to be building new homes? Are they going to be giving us down payments? Uh, no. This emergency would grant unprecedented federal powers to reshape the market. The Treasury Secretary, a man named Scott Besson,

Confirmed, everything is on the table, including standardizing local zoning codes. They want to use emergency powers to override your local community's decisions. So that fight that you're having over a new apartment complex, forget it. The feds may soon just decide that your neighborhood park would look much better as a 30-story luxury vinyl plank paradise, probably owned by a guy who lists his yacht as his primary residence. And it gets worse. They've also created a task force to identify federal and federal. for housing. And this sounds great until you realize the federal government owns 80% of Nevada,

63% of Utah, and 45% of California. They're not planning to build duplexes in San Francisco or Miami or New York City. They're planning to build condos for rattlesnakes and whatever weirdos are really into Mad Max cosplay. It's a massive giveaway to developers to build in the middle of nowhere. And it does absolutely nothing for you unless you want to live in the middle of nowhere. Look, I think most of us can agree that for decades, agencies like HUD have become bloated, inefficient, and haven't served the American people as they should. The idea of changing that, of actually draining the swamp, is what many of us have been asking for. It's what a lot of us voted for.

So when you hear that the administration is bringing in an outside tiger team, like the one Elon must put together to find efficiencies, the intent is right on target. We must cut waste. But this is where we have to ask the hard questions. This isn't just about a consulting report. The word is that this team is literally operating inside of HUD right now with plans to freeze funds, fire nearly half the staff, and cut $1.25 billion. The goal is efficiency, and that's a goal I support, but the method is a blitzkrieg.

It's incredibly aggressive. And when you move that fast, are you really just trimming the fat? Or are you cutting into the bone and muscle without even knowing it? And this brings us to the bigger picture, Project 2025. Again, the idea is to tackle the massive failing bureaucracy, but the proposal is a 44% cut to HUD's programs, a $33.6 billion cut. And as a patriot who loves this country, I got to ask, at what cost? When you use a sledgehammer that big, you don't just hit waste, you hit everything. So let's look at what's actually in this plan.

It would convert rental assistance into state block grants. Now, I'm all for more local control, but the fear is this isn't really about control. It's just about sending less money to the states and then forcing them to figure it out. It imposes two-year time limits on housing assistance. The goal is to promote work, which we all support. I'm all about that. But what about the elderly, the disabled? What about families and towns where the jobs have already left?

It would eliminate community development block grants and cut long-term support for homelessness programs. This is the part that's deeply concerning. This isn't a scalpel. It's a chainsaw. We're talking about 90,000 people in the Bay Area along. who could lose their housing support. And those aren't abstract numbers. Those are families.

Those are people. Those are veterans. Those are people who are trying. But the system, it's already staffed against them. Are we fixing the government by pushing tens of thousands of people into a brutal rental market? One that's increasingly being cornered by Wall Street. Now, this isn't a left or a right issue. This is a common sense issue.

It's the exact point that congressman made when he looked the HUD secretary in the face and said, you're not doing God's work. We do have to do. to fix what's broken in this country and there's plenty that's broken. But we cannot break our own people in the process. And this brings us to the main event, the crown jewel of the entire grift, the privatization of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Now stay with me here. Fannie and Freddie are the weird, boring government-sponsored companies that basically are the American mortgage market. They guarantee $6.6 trillion in mortgage debt. The only reason your affordable 30-year fixed-rate

mortgage even exists is because of their implicit government guarantee. and Wall Street wants to buy them. They are quietly calculating what could be a $330 billion public offering. And here's the most infuriating part. After the 2008 bailout, Fannie and Freddie already paid the government back $301 billion. That's $110 billion more than they were given. So this isn't a rescue. It's a heist.

The second they become private companies, that government guarantee that keeps your mortgage rate stable, it vanishes. Your mortgage rates will inevitably go up. Also, a few investment banks can cash in on the largest financial transaction in years. So, the government is cutting your safety net, and Wall Street is about to make your mortgage more expensive. Who, you might ask, is actually buying all of these houses? Institutional investors.

And you will hear media reports saying, oh, they only own 0.67% of all housing. That is a dangerously misleading statistic. That's like saying, a great white shark only owns 0.67% of the ocean. It doesn't matter. What matters is where are they feeding? No, in Atlanta, investors own 25% of the single-family rental market. In Jacksonville, 21%, in Charlotte, 18%. Right now, investors account for nearly 30% of all single-family home purchases, the highest rate on record,

and they are targeting the exact homes first-time buyers need. Starter homes under $300,000. They show up with all cash. They waive their inspections and they close in five days. And you, with your FHA loan and your quaint desire to make sure that the foundation isn't made of Swiss cheese, you can't compete. And the result, the average age of a first-time home buyer right now has hit 38 years old. That's up five years in just the last five years. You're supposed to be having a midlife crisis and buying a sports car at that age, not finally moving out of your parents' basement.

And once they own the houses, it gets even worse. They're using algorithmic price-fixing software like RealPages Yield Star to illegally collude and hike your rent. In Seattle, rents rose 33% in real page buildings, while non-alorithm buildings only saw a 3.9% increase. Multiple attorneys general are suing them for this right now. And executives at firms like Blackstone, which just bought 37,000 more homes are on earnings calls, celebrating that new construction is down 75%. They're celebrating that. It's saying that it creates pricing power for rental housing assets.

They're not just buying the monopoly. They're bragging about it. This is all happening at the exact same time as the Great Wealth Transfer, where $84 trillion is moving from baby boomers to their kids. But it's creating a two-tier system, kids whose parents can give them a house and, well, everybody else. So, one, the government plans to cut housing aid for the poor. Two, is simultaneously helping developers grab federal land. Three, Wall Street is planning to privatize the mortgage system to make borrowing more expensive. And four, giant investor groups are algorithmically buying up every store.

starter home in sight and jacking up the rent. This is the housing reset they're preparing. They are systematically turning the American dream of ownership into a lifelong subscription service where the rent is always due and your landlord is a server farm in Delaware. And here's your mic drop fact. While 75% of American households cannot afford a median price new home, 26% of all home purchases last year were made in cash. The highest rate ever recorded. This isn't rich families buying vacation homes. It's investors systematically outbidding families who need financing. So what can you do? Well, first, pay attention to local zoning. That emergency power to override your town. It only works if you're not at the meetings. So show up, scream about it.

Second thing, support tenant protection laws and write to purchase acts, which give tenants the first crack at buying their building before a corporation can. And finally, demand your representatives in Congress. Stop the privatization of Fannie and Freddie. This is. isn't a left or right issue. This is a, can I please just live somewhere without selling a kidney issue? Those are the actions that you can take to fight back and you absolutely should do them.

You should call your representatives. You should show up at those local zoning meetings. You have to make your voice heard, but we need to be realistic. We have to be logical about what we're really up against. Will it work? It might, but let's be perfectly honest. It probably won't.

I mean, is your phone call going to stop a $330 billion Wall Street payday? Is your protest at town hall going to stop institutional investors who are algorithmically buying 30% of the starter homes with cash? This reset, it's already in motion. The train is, it's left the station. So that brings us to the hard truth. You can spend all your energy trying to stop them or you can figure out how to get a ticket. And this is the part they don't want you knowing about. If you can't beat them, your next best course of action is to join them. And here's what I mean. While they're systematically

locking you out of homeownership, they're simultaneously creating the biggest wealth-building opportunity in a generation. And you've heard this before, certainly. A rising tide lifts all boats. While the institutional investors flooding the market aren't just buying houses to be evil, they're buying them because real estate is about to become the most profitable asset class of the next decade. Think about it. If Wall Street is spending hundreds of billions to corner the housing market, if algorithms are determining rent prices, if the government is literally reshaping zoning laws to benefit developers, they obviously see something coming that's going to make them obscenely wealthy. The question isn't whether this real estate boom is happening. It's already

happening. The question is, are you going to sit on the sidelines complaining about how unfair it is, and it is unfair, or are you going to figure out how to get a piece of the action because you can? If you're tired of being the target, it's time to learn how to be the investor. A lack of capital has killed a lot of dreams. but only for the people who don't know the loophole. If you have a 680 credit score or better and could use up to 150K at 0% to kickstart your next venture, get approval in 30 seconds or less, and you don't even have to talk to anyone at loophole lending.com. Okay, back to the show.

And look, we need to talk about your city budget. And I know, I know, I know, I know. Just saying the words municipal finance is basically a human sleep aid. It's that topic you instinctively scroll past on your news feed to get to a video of a raccoon trying to wash its cotton candy. But here's the thing. While you've been watching that adorable little trash pan to have an existential crisis, your city council has been rummaging through your wallet. Like, well, like a slightly more organized raccoon in a tiny sensible suit. They're doing it with something called stealth taxes.

Because your local government has figured out that you, the American public, get very angry if they tried to raise the big, obvious property tax. You get out the pitchforks. You make angry signs. You might even, God forbid, show up to a Tuesday night meeting. So they've just decided to skip all that and hide new taxes and places you're less likely to look. It's the political equivalent of your parents hiding vegetables in your mac and cheese. But the mac and cheese is your electric bill and the vegetable is financial ruin. Let's start with the honest ones in Wellington, Utah. They apparently just gave up on stealth entirely and are proposing a 225% price. property tax increase. That's not a tax hike. That's a hostage situation. Your new bill isn't a tax.

It's a ransom note. We have your city services. If you ever want to see them again, pay $487 more. We know where your garbage lives. But that's amateur hour. The real professionals are much sneakier. Take California, a state that is basically just an avocado held together by anxiety and development impact fees. They've gotten so good at this. Cities like Palmdale are now hitting up to 10 and a quarter percent combined sales tax. You are paying a 10 percent surcharge just for the privilege of buying a bag of funions. You're not just buying a snack. You are single-handedly funding the city's entire pothole filling and then immediately forgetting about it again department. And it gets worse. The real five-star grift is in your utility bills. This is where it goes from

annoying to full-blown late-stage capitalism fever dream. In Nevada, NV Energy just got approval for a revolutionary new billing system. Well, this morning, the Public Utilities Commission of Nevada stopped short granting that in the energy, the 9% rate increase it wanted. But it did sign off on a change in the times in your households will pay the most for using your electricity.

The confusing part, it'll be different for everybody. They're not just going to charge you for how much electricity you use. Oh no, that's for simpletons. They're going to start charging you based on the single 15 minute period where you used the most electricity all day. It's called a daily demand charge. And think of it this way. If you dare to run your air conditioner, your microwave, and scandal reruns all at the same time just for 15 minutes,

bam. Your bill for the entire day is based on that one moment of frantic multitasking desperation. It's like your power company is a vindictive high school principal who catches you running in the hall one time and then gives you detention for the rest of the year. What's that, Mrs. Johnson? You tried to vacuum while toasting a Pop-Tart? That's a peak demand violation. Your rate just tripled. Enjoy your darkness. But wait, there's more.

Because they are never done finding new things to charge you for. You like parking in your car? That's adorable. San Diego. Just doubled its parking meter rates. Eliminated free Sundays. And for any event near the stadium, they're charging $10 per hour. That's not a parking fee.

That's a luxury car lease. You are paying $10 an hour for the pre-cent. of not having your car toad while you watch millionaires play catch. You like throwing things away? Los Angeles just approved a 54% increase in trash collection fees. And for small apartments, it's a hundred and thirty percent increase. They're literally charging you more to take away your own garbage. At this point, it's cheaper to just compost your trash in your own bathtub.

And my personal favorite, the absolute pinnacle of this nonsense, stormwater fees. Cities like Eugene Orrush. Oregon and Flagstaff, Arizona are now charging you a fee based on how much impervious surface you have on your property. That is a tax on your driveway. You are being fined for the rain. They have successfully monetized the weather. What's next?

A sunshine fading your curtains fee? A breeze mildly inconveniencing your picnic surcharge? Oh, and we're not done. The most shameless. The absolute cheek of it all comes from cities in Oregon. They're not even trying to hide it anymore. They are just adding a public safety fee. It's called a daily demand charge.

And think of it this way. Troutdale, $15 a month. Gresham, $15 a month. Corvallis, $33.64 a month. They've just decided that police and fire, you know, the most basic fundamental function of a city, the one they wanted to defund, is now an a la carte menu item.

It's like subscribing to Netflix, but instead of the crown, you get not having your house burned down. Sorry, sir, only subscribe to the basic fire plan. We can put out the kitchen, but the living room, that's a premium. Now look, your city will tell you we have to do this. Our infrastructure is crumbling, inflation, federal mandates,

and fine, some of that is true. But the point is, by hiding these hikes in 17 different bills, they avoid having one single honest conversation about how much the city costs and who should pay for it. So here's the actionable advice. And I'm sorry, you're gonna hate it. You have to pay attention to this. attention to the boring stuff. The utility bill you just auto pay. Read the fine print. That

weird mailer from the Jordan Valley Water Conservancy District. Don't throw it out. And you have to show up to the city council and utility commission meetings. Yeah, they are boring. They are designed to be boring. They are engineered to be soul-crushingly dull that you'd rather be getting a root canal from a dentist who won't stop talking about his boat. But that is where they are deciding to tax your rain and charge you for your 15 minutes of Pop-Tart fueled chaos. You gotta go. And here's where it goes from ridiculous to absolutely criminal in some California jurisdictions. Development impact fees. That's the stealth tax a builder pays just to get permission to build a new house. They can be as high as $47,742. That's it. That's the fee. They are literally charging the price of a brand new Audi A3

just for the idea of a house. And then they wonder why no one can afford to live there. And here's a thing. California's obsession with these fees traces back to one decision in 1978. Proposition 13. Voters said, we hate property taxes. So the city said, fine, we'll just hide them in 47 different places. It's like telling your teenager they can't spend your money. So they start a lemonade stand charging $50 per cup. Stealth taxes, they feel like a trap.

But the same system draining you is the one some people quietly flip to their advantage. Because while your city is busy nickel and dimeing you with rain taxes and pop-tart penalties, there's an entire class of people who have figured out how to use the very thing that destroys most people's wealth, debt, to actually build it, how they're playing by completely different rules using strategies that sound backwards until you see the math. And once you understand what they're really doing, you'll never look at your monthly bills the same way again. The question is, are you ready to learn what they don't want you to know? Well, let's pull back the curtain. Two neighbors.

One retires at 55. Set for life. The other at 67 sits at 2 a.m. calculator in hand, trying to figure out if his $180,000 in savings will last until he dies. Why? What did the 55-year-old do differently? Safe is the new broke. This isn't fiction.

The median American age 65 to 74 has only about $164,000 saved for retirement. You did everything right. Save 10% of every paycheck. Maxed out your 401k avoided debt like the plague. But you just realized you might still outlive your money. Meanwhile, your neighbor, who makes half what you do, just bought his third rental property and retired at 55. What did he know that you didn't?

Here's the uncomfortable truth. 64% of Americans now fear running out of money and retirement more than they fear death. So what separates those who build lasting wealth from those who work until they die? It's not income. It's not luck. It's not intelligence. It's this. The wealthy use other people's money. Everyone else uses their own. Here's the math of your financial advisor won't tell you. If you save $500 a month for 30 years at 7% return, you'll have about $612,000. Sounds pretty good, right? No. That $612,000 in 30 years will only buy what $2,500,000. $51,000 buys today.

You literally worked your entire life to go backwards. Inflation is eating your lunch every year. Taxes are taking their cut and life's emergencies, the car breakdown, the medical bill, the job loss are all setting you back years at a time. 37% of Americans can't even cover a $400 emergency expense without borrowing or selling something. So listen, I need to tell you something. Your financial advisor, your bank, even your pay, Parents, they've been giving you incomplete advice.

Not intentionally, but they've been repeating the same advice that keeps 95% of people trapped forever. Stuff like debt is dangerous. Always pay cash if you can. Save consistently and invest for the long run. Here's what they don't tell you. Mostly because they just don't know. Nearly every wealthy person uses debt to get ahead, every single one. They understand that debt.

used wisely is a powerful tool to multiply results, to defer taxes, to mitigate risk, to preserve flexibility. Mark Zuckerberg, worth over $100 billion, took out almost a $6 million mortgage. He certainly had the cash to buy the house outright. But why tie up his money when he could borrow at a rate below inflation?

That's essentially a free loan, while his cash earns higher returns elsewhere. And let me show you exactly how this works with a real example. Let's say you've got 300,000, $300,000 to invest. You could buy one rental house outright for $300,000, no debt. Or you could use that $300,000 as 25% down payments on four houses totaling $1.2 million in property, with $900,000 of it financed. 30 years later, which scenario makes you richer?

Option one, one house doubles to $600,000 bucks and produces maybe $3,000 a month in rent once it's paid off. Option two, four houses double to $2.4 million, and all four are paid off by tenant rent. Combined rental income, $12,000 per month. Four leverage properties vastly outshine one free and clear property. This is why the wealthy choose control over ownership. Bryce Stewart, a middle school teacher from Pennsylvania making around $50,000 a year, used these exact principles. He started with an FHA loan and built a portfolio of 30,000.

rental units. He retired from teaching at age 35 because his rentals now pay him $17,000 to $20,000 per month. He replaced his job income with investment income by leveraging other people's money. Debt. But isn't that risky? Here's the truth. It's not the debt that's risky. It's the operator. Every person who's built wealth with debt follows the same five non-negotiable rules to mitigate this risk. Rule number one, get educated first. Never invest in what you don't understand. Knowledge reduces risk. Before taking on debt to buy any asset, invest in your own financial education.

Rule number two, stay actively involved. This isn't passive. When you use debt to invest, you are the pilot of the ship. Stay on top of your investments. Rule number three, buy with built-in equity. You make your money when you're money. buy not when you sell purchase below market value to create instant equity and protection rule number four ensure positive cash flow the assets income must exceed the debt expenses cash flow

it's king if it can't pay for itself and put money in your pocket it's not a good deal rule number five scale systematically once the model works for you repeat it carefully grow at a a pace where you stay in control. Follow these rules and debt becomes your servant. Break them and it becomes your master. If you want the complete playbook for using debt the right way, including the three types of funding every smart investor keeps ready, I've put together a free guide. But here's what I've learned after helping thousands of people. Most will read the guide, get excited, then do nothing. Why? Because they get overwhelmed by all the different debt strategies and don't know which one to start with. Should you begin with business credit lines,

hard money loans, traditional mortgages, partnership deals? There's actually a hierarchy, a specific order that minimizes risk and maximizes your chances of success. The difference between good debt and bad debt isn't just what you buy, it's the strategy you use and the order you use it in. If you want to see the complete debt hierarchy and exactly which strategy to start with based on your situation, along with a list of lenders ready, willing, and able to work with you, check the link below. I don't need your email or anything. Just click it and it's yours. My gift to you. And if you want to jump to the head of the line and secure your first line of credit in like 30 seconds or less, I just helped one of my students get approved for $148,000. Zero

interest, no collateral, no bank headaches. Another used this exact process to fix up one of his income properties. And another finally launched their business with $12,000. $12,000 line of credit without touching their own savings. And right now, it's actually easier than ever to get fast funding like this. But hardly anyone knows about it because the banks keep this loophole under wraps. It's a 100% legal, legit banking glitch that a handful of big banks set up. But they've kept it out of the spotlight. You know, one client thought it was way too good to be true until he was sitting on $150,000,

using it to scale his deals and paying zero interest. No property, no business assets, no hoops. There is a catch, though. If your credit score is 680 or higher and you haven't had any big credit hiccups in the last seven years, you're probably good to go, but that's it. That's the catch. And if you've tried using your own money for every deal or worse, missed out because you couldn't get fast approvals, this is your window. The program is alive and well for now, but I honestly don't know how much longer it'll last. You know how these things go. Once too many people jump in, banks, they might close the loophole. So there is a pin comment below with the drive.

direct link and all the details I put some additional information in the description. The process, it's super easy. It'll take you about 30 seconds to get your answer. No social security number required, and you don't even have to talk to anybody to see what you're approved for. That's actually my favorite part. So go check it out. If you like what you see, there will be simple, clear instructions for the next step and then you can pick up your funds. I'm rooting for you. Go get what's yours. Take care. This podcast is a part of the C-suite Radio Network. For more top visit c-sweetradio.com