Apple's claiming their headquarters is worth only $200

[BlueChinchillaEatingDorito]

1 minute ago, DrMacintosh said:

Of course they are going to explore every avenue to protect their cash and not pay taxes on it. You would too. 

If only we were able to. #ThanksTrudeau 

[rcmaehl]

What Good Guy Apple meant to say was:

Quote

Tax Assessors: This building is worth $1 billion

Apple: Actually, it's worth $200

Apple: $200 billion that is.

Apple: No seriously, all the toilets are solid gold from all the iPhone sales.

 

They're actually trying to pay MORE taxes obviously. 

[asus killer]

Just now, DrMacintosh said:

I mean for good reason. When you have all this cash laying around getting taxed at the corporate tax rate is a big blow. Imagine for a second than any corporation payed its fully owed taxes without any deductions or anything......

 

Taxing Apples revenue at something close to 35%+ every year is brutal. Of course they are going to explore every avenue to protect their cash and not pay taxes on it. You would too. 

what???

 

35% is 35%, no matter if you own the biggest corporation in the world or a lemonade stand. The 35% does not enter in the theory of relativity 

[TacoSenpai]

Can I buy it with an equivalent value of mayonnaise jars?

[DrMacintosh]

2 minutes ago, asus killer said:

what???

 

35% is 35%, no matter if you own the biggest corporation in the world or a lemonade stand. The 35% does not enter in the theory of relativity 

In pure numbers 35% of $1 is not much....but 35% of a million dollars is a lot more both numerically and perceptually, especially when you are a corporation with overhead and a payroll. 

 

 

[DrMacintosh]

2 minutes ago, LordOTaco said:

Can I buy it with an equivalent value of mayonnaise jars?

How much mayo are we talkin here? Lol. 

[TacoSenpai]

4 minutes ago, DrMacintosh said:

How much mayo are we talkin here? Lol. 

$200 dollars worth...now I have some contacts on the black market and can raise that value to $500 if need be.  These are the important questions here.

 

 

According to Walmarts site at $3.48 a jar of 500ml Mayo that comes out to about 144 jars for $500.

[asus killer]

1 minute ago, DrMacintosh said:

In pure numbers 35% of $1 is not much....but 35% of a million dollars is a lot more both numerically and perceptually, especially when you are a corporation with overhead and a payroll. 

 

 

i get it's a big sum of money. But if it's a lot is because they made a lot. But those 35% cost exactly as much as 35% for anyone else, that's the beauty of percentages.

[Jtalk4456]

1 minute ago, DrMacintosh said:

Let’s assume for a moment that Tim Cook, Apples tax department and income managers were all in on this and thought it would fly.......

That would be incredibly stupid. You don’t build the worlds most valuable company in the world and then squander it by committing tax fraud after you just hit $1 Trillion.....

 

Now lets also assume for a moment that there might be a disgruntled employee, a error when filing their paperwork, or corporate espionage.....

Now between those two hypothetical scenarios, which one do you think makes more sense?

 

Apple essentially has internal security and investigators, so once we get an official statement those people will have probably already been dispatched if the later case is true rather than the former. 

i see your skepticism, but i think you're missing a point. These are all open claims. No fraud has been committed yet. they make a claim that their property is worth nothing, state says "do you think were dumb?", then apple just fights it in court for years. They will not win, but they are keeping it open, and the cost of lawyers is cheaper than the taxes they would pay. Also to address 

Quote

which one do you think makes more sense?

1. how do you change 1,000,000,000 into 200 on accident...?

2. There are almost 500 open appeals cases in the court system, that's not a single accident anymore

3. Also there are appeals, meaning apple got the appraisal numbers and got a lawyer to fight it and say the number isn't correct. 

so to answer your question, between apple (known for drastic tax reduction measures) intentionally holding tax cases up in court for years to avoid paying

or 500 accidental appeals cases, I find the first option far more likely.

[ScratchCat]

2 hours ago, YedZed said:

Fuck it, I'm going all in. 400 dollars for the entirety of the trillion dollar company's headquarters!

I raise you ONE HUNDRED TRILLION _Zimbwabe DOLLARS!

 

Apple is generally smart but how the actual **** do they expect to convince a court that the building is worth $200? Even if the land was previously used as a nuclear test site the valuation would be higher.

[asus killer]

Just now, ScratchCat said:

I raise you ONE HUNDRED TRILLION _Zimbwabe DOLLARS!

 

Apple is generally smart but how the actual **** do they expect to convince a court that the building is worth $200? Even if the land was previously used as a nuclear test site the valuation would be higher.

i raise you some venezuelan bolivars, i stopped counting, it's the money for today's breakfast.

 

[TacoSenpai]

1 minute ago, ScratchCat said:

I raise you ONE HUNDRED TRILLION _Zimbwabe DOLLARS!

 

Apple is generally smart but how the actual **** do they expect to convince a court that the building is worth $200? Even if the land was previously used as a nuclear test site the valuation would be higher.

That is clearly a counterfit bill it is missing Gaztons da commanda.  He does not no do whey

[ScratchCat]

2 minutes ago, Jtalk4456 said:

1. how do you change 1,000,000,000 into 200 on accident...?

Cats

2 minutes ago, Jtalk4456 said:

2. There are almost 500 open appeals cases in the court system, that's not a single accident anymore

Apple has a lot of cats?

3 minutes ago, Jtalk4456 said:

3. Also there are appeals, meaning apple got the appraisal numbers and got a lawyer to fight it and say the number isn't correct. 

so to answer your question, between apple (known for drastic tax reduction measures) intentionally holding tax cases up in court for years to avoid paying

or 500 accidental appeals cases, I find the first option far more likely.

[peanuts104]

I work in commercial real estate, though not in California.   Generally speaking, most companies fight property taxes. Part of the difficulty in valuing this particular building would be its uniqueness.  You can't really compare it to anything that's sold because nothing similar to it has sold.  The assessor is probably basing their assessment on the cost to build it and considering it was completed last year that wouldn't be unreasonable.  According to Wikipedia it cost apple $5 billion to build. 

 

However the county's assessment has to be based on what is fair and reasonable compared to how other similar properties in the area are assessed.  As stated there isn't anything that is like this, however they should have at least looked at nearby offices and seen what they were assessed at to determine if the assessment of $838 million (the actual real property assessment) was reasonble.  The building has approx 2.8 million square feet, and thus it is assessed at approx $300 per square foot.

 

While it's not 100% analogous obviously and it's in a different county, if you look at the recently completed Salesforce Tower in San Francisco with approx 1.6 mil square feet, it has an assessment of approx $336 mil, which gives us $210 per square foot, and the land value in downtown SF would be much higher than Cupertino, though there's also less of it obviously because one is a skyscraper and the other is a massive campus.

 

TLDR

 

It's normal for companies (and individuals) to protest their real estate taxes.  You could make an argument that $300 per square foot is high, but obviously saying it's only worth $200 total is completely absurd.  I would love to hear their rationale.

[S w a t s o n]

Guys they clearly have a "legal obligation" to their shareholders to defraud the US government on property taxes because they must make every dollar possible

/s

[mynameisjuan]

7 minutes ago, peanuts104 said:

I would love to hear their rationale.

They charge $70 for a VGA adapter....what rationale are you expecting

[DrMacintosh]

10 minutes ago, Swatson said:

Guys they clearly have a "legal obligation" to their shareholders to defraud the US government on property taxes because they must make every dollar possible

/s

They aren’t being defrauded if they set up the system that allows companies to appeal how much they should pay indefinitely. 

[Arika]

Apple: the only corporation in the us that people will happily defend for tax evasion.

 

When people ask me "what business practices do you hate about Apple?" Shit like this.

 

And to those saying it's "legal" (it won't be if it goes to court), doesn't mean it's right, guarantee that if this was any other company, say, google or Microsoft, you would not be saying the same thing.

[S w a t s o n]

Just now, DrMacintosh said:

They aren’t being defrauded if they set up the system that allows companies to appeal how much they should pay indefinitely. 

Never change

[peanuts104]

Just now, valdyrgramr said:

Um, no I wouldn't.  My options are to pay my taxes or go to federal prison.  Hm, which is more worth it?  I think I'll pay my taxes.

 

3 minutes ago, Arika S said:

Apple: the only corporation in the us that people will happily defend for tax evasion.

 

When people ask me "what business practices do you hate about Apple?" Shit like this.

 

And to those saying it's "legal" (it won't be if it goes to court), doesn't mean it's right, guarantee that if this was any other company, say, google or Microsoft, you would not be saying the same thing.

 

You can protest them if you think they're too high though, at least in the US.  No fraud or tax evasion has taken place.  They're in the protest process still.  The more I think about it, the more I think the $200 is a placeholder.  They probably wouldn't want to give them a number because they just want the lowest number they can get.  But this all seems to be part of the normal tax appeal process.  I bet Alphabet does the same thing.

[ScratchCat]

17 minutes ago, asus killer said:

i raise you some venezuelan bolivars, i stopped counting, it's the money for today's breakfast.

I raise you one inflationary universe

27 minutes ago, LordOTaco said:

That is clearly a counterfit bill it is missing Gaztons da commanda.  He does not no do whey

Yes     but zeros

[Jito463]

2 hours ago, YedZed said:

If we're still auctioning this, I raise you one Mocha Latte at Starbucks.

Whoa, whoa, whoa!  Let's not get crazy now.  That's some serious money we're getting into here.

1 hour ago, DrMacintosh said:

Now lets also assume for a moment that there might be a disgruntled employee, a error when filing their paperwork, or corporate espionage.....

Now between those two hypothetical scenarios, which one do you think makes more sense?

One instance?  Maybe.  Nearly 500 instances?!  Yeah, not buying that theory.

[Arika]

3 minutes ago, peanuts104 said:

They probably wouldn't want to give them a number because they just want the lowest number they can get.

That's called tax evasion, if I claimed I only made $200 last financial year instead of $70k the tax office would be on my ass.

 

Who in their right mind in any kind of capacity would accept that building is worth $200? There is no need for a placeholder when valuations exist. You don't run a trillion dollar company and not know what your HQ is worth

[peanuts104]

Just now, Arika S said:

That's called tax evasion, if I claimed I only made $200 last financial year instead of $70k the tax office would be on my ass.

 

Who in their right mind in any kind of capacity would accept that building is worth $200? There is no need for a placeholder when valuations exist. You don't run a trillion dollar company and not know what your HQ is worth

No, it's called protesting your taxes.  The tax office may require that you input what you think the assessment should be.  You wouldn't put in what you think it's worth because you don't know what the county will accept as a more reasonable assessment.  Therefore you put in an absurdly low value that obviously isn't correct to start the negotiation process.  If Apple paid the county whatever percentage of $200 and said we're all Gucci, then yes, that would be fraud.  Right now they're protesting their taxes, just like you can do if you own real property.  

 

Also, it's not the same as federal or state income tax.  Property taxes are handled by much smaller jurisdictions, in this case Santa Cruz County.

[Arika]

3 minutes ago, peanuts104 said:

No, it's called protesting your taxes.  The tax office may require that you input what you think the assessment should be.  You wouldn't put in what you think it's worth because you don't know what the county will accept as a more reasonable assessment.  Therefore you put in an absurdly low value that obviously isn't correct to start the negotiation process.  If Apple paid the county whatever percentage of $200 and said we're all Gucci, then yes, that would be fraud.  Right now they're protesting their taxes, just like you can do if you own real property.  

 

Also, it's not the same as federal or state income tax.  Property taxes are handled by much smaller jurisdictions, in this case Santa Cruz County.

Given that apple have been dodging taxes for years, I don't accept this argument, being the company the are, they have to know what their assets are worth (otherwise they can't claim they are worth a trillion dollars) this includes any property, and again, with them being apple the county will also know what it's worth since property valuations are a thing and the county will be trying to get the taxes owed to them. But they will fight tooth and nail to pay as little as possible, because apple has a massive aversion to paying out.

 

So the county knows what it's worth, apple will say it's only "$200" and so they will "negotiate" a compromise that is well below it's actual value meaning the county will not be paid what they are owed, but they will feel like it's a win (though it a actually isnt) or they will refuse to negotiate with Apple who will then threaten to up and leave leaving the county no choice but to accept a lower figure or risk losing the company completely