The cruise ship game of musical chairs brings to mind the land based version that is happening in my community.
Many investors from northern states own second homes in our beach community that they rent out to tourists in the summer. Many in fact are mini hotels, pure financial vehicles with dozens of rooms and bathrooms that rent for $10,000 to $20,000 a week. There was an influx of out of state folks a few weeks ago, unusual for this time of year, so the decision was made to block access to non residents. Many more are clamoring that they need to come and get their properties ready for summer in spite of the fact that they have local real estate companies under contract performing that work for them.
The real reason they are demanding entry is obvious. Understandably, they want to escape the cities they live in but theyâre whining and accusing us of being selfish and mean by not giving in to their excuses.
Our reasoning is obvious and should be easily understood. We are geared for an increase in population during the summer. In the winter months we revert to a small close knit community of locals. The fact is that our supplies are limited, we have a scarcity of medical professionals, a limited number of doctors, our small hospital has only 20 beds and no ICU capabilities. Our medical infrastructure is more oriented to soothe sunburns and tend to minor ailments and injuries.
Many of them donât care. They are in fact the ones being selfish and acting entitled as they would overwhelm our resources. If even one brought in the Covid19 virus, we could easily be decimated. Itâs happening in many other similar communities.
A crisis or this magnitude brings out the best in some people but also the worst in others.
This exact problem was resolved many decades ago in the UK whereby the Welsh burnt down the holiday homes of the English; sorted.
I agree. I live in a winter/summer version of your tourist community. The county commissioners politely asked that all the second (third/fourth) homeowners go back to their primary residence by the quickest and safest means possible. That promptly led to several unironically complaining in the local papers about being unlawfully evicted from the properties they pay taxes on. While we actually do have good medical infrastructure, thatâs not the point. We already have more than a handful of confirmed cases in the town and county. What we donât need is more people going to the supermarkets, hanging about, using the essential services that are already cut back like everything else.
Sure they pay taxes, but so do us year-round residents. But as residents we get to vote, and we voted for the people asking these selfish ass-hats to go home. Stay home like everyone else is.
Does your county/community pay for the services that you mentioned through a county income tax or from your state general fund that is funded mostly through a state income tax? OR does the county/community pay for those services through user fees, county property tax & a small additional added sales tax for your county like they do in my county which is a different state than yours? Iâm glad the urbanites from the high tax loving states have mostly stayed away from my little part of paradise. I donât like the carpetbaggers anymore than anyone else. But if they paid top dollar from one of your community members to own the property & then pay top dollar in property taxes because they canât file for a homestead exemption on that tax Iâm inclined to be more sympathetic to them than your community.
Hornblower is probably right. Burn their houses down, let them get their insurance money, let all the businesses & workers that survive off the tourist money close their doors forever & adjust your county/community budgets to survive only tax money from local fulltime residents. The bait & switch tactics of these vacation communities sounds criminal to me.
Sounds like angry, Cape, Massholes to me. Live by the NY tax dollars / die by the NY tax dollars. You made the deal. Canât have it both ways. I hope youâve enjoyed the schools NYers built for you filthy, cheap bastards.
Iâve always loved that argument, âbut, Iâm a local!â 
Wrong State 
Iâd still live here quite happily without getting invaded by hordes of tourons every summer: âHow far is it between mileposts?â 
PS Good luck finding somebody to deny this was a much nicer place to live before it was âdiscoveredâ by money grubbing carpetbaggers and their neighbors.
First I would like to say I have no animosity towards the O.P. I like the guy as much as a reasonable person can like a faceless character that you get to know from comments on an open forum. No ill will intended. If he didnât want to know how others felt he shouldnât of asked.
The selfishness that these beach communities have shown in this national crisis will save me thousands of dollars in the remainding years of my life. I say this because I have given thousands of dollars to hurricane relief funds over the years. When on vacation in these communities I have been accused of being overly generous & over paying a lot. I donât think that will be the case any longer. If these communities can turn their backs on their fellow local taxpayers who are running for their lives in a national crisis why in the hell should I give them one red cent when the biannual hurricane comes to send them back to the stone ages? Crisises brings out the best & the worst in people & apparently a lot of these people in these vacation communities are the worst.
Furthermore, my church has given into the hundreds of thousands of dollars in hurricane relief since Iâve been attending. I know several retirees & other do-gooderâs who flock to the coasts whenever help is needed. I gave a niece $500 for her HS graduation present & she donated half to a hurricane relief charity. Screw that for now on IMO. If they only want to take care of themselves now let them take care of themselves when they are looking at a pile of rubble that used to be their home. I hope somebody makes a list of vacation spots that donât give a flying shit about anybody except those who they see in the off season.
We have some of the lowest property taxes Iâve heard of. It comes out to about $1k per $1mil. Itâs about 1/20th of many NY towns.
I donât think weâre entirely being selfish. The general national directive is to stop traveling and spreading. If people start showing up from all over the country then that is the complete opposite of what is needed.
Some states ask that you self quarantine for two weeks when you arrive from another state. How does that work when you show up here and everyone shops at the same small supermarket?
As far as I know, second homes pay the same amount of property taxes as full timers. There are hotel type taxes which support an infratructure to accomodate tourists. Those who live here year round live comparatively very simple lives. Most can survive happily with the restricted number of restaurants that stay open in winter. Attractions designed to separate the tourists from their money close shop. We donât miss them.
The difference is that the hurricane brings itself, but infected vacation people bring their own hurricane. The one canât be helped, but the other is avoidable.
(I have no dog in this fight. I own my own Costa Rican holiday island, and have no neighbors, except for that T-rex on the island next door. And I switched my private security army to all robotic last year, to avoid the payroll taxes⌠)
Well in that case the locals shouldnât have waited until a national emergency to tell fellow taxpayers & property owners that they werenât welcomed with the decree to keep them out. They should have made that decree or ordnance 30 years ago before their tax dollars paid for the ferries, roads, schools, fire houses, public parks, public waterfronts, public marinas, police station etc. Sounds like some low down bait & switch business dealing to me.
I recall you mentioning your community before, saying how nice it was & how youâre not originally from there. Do you think you would moved there & enjoy it as much if it didnât have the nice ferries, roads, schools, fire houses, public parks, public waterfronts, public marinas, police station etc.? Also, how do you think your follow locals would be treating you if you moved into town 3 months ago instead of when you did?
Helping each other in times of crisis is what Americans do. Anybody living on a sandbar battered by hurricanes is aware of the risks and help is always welcome in times of crisis The same applies to every other part of the country. Communities here survived long before that kind of help was conceivable and will continue to do so.
More importantly, your support of entitled âme firstâ cretins running around the countryside, running for their lives (your words), spreading the virus to vulnerable communities is beyond outrageous.
It is particularly egregious because it flies directly in the face of government instructions to the contrary broadcast 24/7 ie stay in place and avoid contact. Your argument is a non starter.
I must have missed the publication of the calendar listing the time and character of upcoming non predictable acts of God and national disasters.
People donât move here because of the amenities otherwise they would move nearer population centers with much better ones. They live here for the natural environment.
Weâre all free to roam around the country under normal circumstances except we are now in the midst of a national emergency caused by a pandemic which is spread by contact and medical experts have told us in the strongest terms that the way to save lives is to stay in place and avoid contact.
Why is that so hard for you to comprehend?
I promise all of you ânot in my back yardersâ, if I owned multiple homes, I would take my family to the safest one.
Thatâs great, stop at each one and mingle a bit. Think of how many suckers you could infect along the way.
First thing, I donât have a dog in this fight either.
I understand the importance of shelter in place but I also understand that it is possible to have more than 1 home & 1 shelter. Many people do it & have been doing it for the length of human history. I 100% agree with the Governor of Florida when he banned hotels & people who rent vacation properties from renting out places for 2 weeks, maybe longer. Now is not the time to vacation. But if a person spends $500,000, a million dollars, maybe more for a home, pays tens of thousands more a year in property taxes, in upkeep & for a local company to watch it when they are gone then they shouldnât be treated like a person renting an Airbnb. Itâs their second homes! They paid shitloads of money for it! I believe if illegal immigrants from Central America showed up & looked for refuge they would be better treated than your fellow out of state property owners/taxpayers. Obviously you & the people in your community have clear consciences (or none) with telling your part time neighbors to get the hell off of their property. That is fine with me really, as I said, crisises brings out to best & worst in people. Hopefully they donât die & can sell later to others who will only see your communityâs better side, at least until another crisis occurs.
The majority of these second homes are rented out throughout summer, turn over every week and are rarely used by owners and only when theyâre not booked.
This is not about property rights, itâs about complying with emergency measures to save lives possibly your own. I havenât heard every press conference from the white house but in the ones I did, I clearly heard the medical experts on the presidentâs task force say repeatedly: the best way to save lives is to stay put and avoid direct contact.
I didnât hear anything about if you can afford a second home as an investment property, this doesnât apply to you and you can hit the road, interact with people and invade your little part time corner of heaven without considering the impact on its vulnerability.
You may or may not be carrying a virus that would decimate that small community but thereâs no way of knowing so why worry. Youâre entitled because youâre a big shot who can afford to own and pay taxes on a second home. When the supply chain collapses and tiny hospitals are overwhelmed, itâs not your problem, youâll just pack up the Escalade and go home. Just like when hurricanes are coming, except we stay behind because we donât have second homes in the city to run off to.
Is that how you see it?
Thatâs below the belt. No one has been ordered off their property or off the island. Relax, visitors here at the time access was closed are not being hunted by stormstoopers chasing a pack of snarling dobermanns on their scent.
Most rental property owners live elsewhere and are in it as an investment. The proceeds from the summer weekly rentals cover the yearly mortgage and they get to use it when no one is renting it. You canât call them neighbors.
Hear, hear!