Irvine Expense Questions

NEW -> Contingent Buyer Assistance Program
S

Schlotkins_IHB

New member
My wife and I are moving to Irvine from the east coast. I'm tryng to get some cost estimate numbers to put in our budget so I was hoping some people could help out. Assume we have a standard 2,000 sq ft home in Irvine, probably on the older construction side. (please avoid the buy vs. rent discussion - thank you.)



1) Property Tax: It appears this number is about 1% of home value - is that correct? I saw some that looked like .5% and some that appeared to be 2%.



2) Home Gas bills: Here our range and dryer is electric. It appears to be gas there most of the time. However, I doubt there is much of a heating season.



3) Electric Bills: Not sure how bad these get in the summer.



4) Home owners insurance: No idea what this runs...



5) Is there a car excise tax in California? Any estimates on auto insurance rates for good drivers with cheap (sub $20,000) cars?



6) Water rates?



That's all I can think of for now... Thanks for any help!
 
[quote author="Schlotkins" date=1208129062]My wife and I are moving to Irvine from the east coast. I'm tryng to get some cost estimate numbers to put in our budget so I was hoping some people could help out. Assume we have a standard 2,000 sq ft home in Irvine, probably on the older construction side. (please avoid the buy vs. rent discussion - thank you.)



1) Property Tax: It appears this number is about 1% of home value - is that correct? I saw some that looked like .5% and some that appeared to be 2%.



2) Home Gas bills: Here our range and dryer is electric. It appears to be gas there most of the time. However, I doubt there is much of a heating season.



3) Electric Bills: Not sure how bad these get in the summer.



4) Home owners insurance: No idea what this runs...



5) Is there a car excise tax in California? Any estimates on auto insurance rates for good drivers with cheap (sub $20,000) cars?



6) Water rates?



That's all I can think of for now... Thanks for any help!</blockquote>
<a href="http://cgi.money.cnn.com/tools/costofliving/costofliving.html">Here</a> is a generic cost of living calculator that might help somewhat.

<blockquote></blockquote>


1. It depends on the home. The base property tax rate in CA is 1%. There may be school bonds or other "community facilities district" bonds that add to the property taxes. The newer the home, the more likely there are bonds on top of the base property tax rate. Your realtor should be able to flesh this out for you on a home by home basis.<blockquote></blockquote>


2. Gas will depend on what kind of clothes dryer and range you have, as well as your water heater (save money and go tankless) and how often you use hot water. You may also have other gas appliances (e.g., bbq) that will raise your usage as well. <a href="http://www.socalgas.com/residential/prices/">Here</a> are the current rates.<blockquote></blockquote>


3. Electric will not be fun if you run your AC a lot in summer. I would also suggest changing your lightbulbs to CFLs because they use less energy and create less heat (so you don't need to run the AC as much). We had one electric bill that was $400 in summer once (for a ~1650 sq ft home). We have cut that down a lot since. The CFLs really helped, as did following a number of other conservation tips. Do a search, as there was a prior post on how to cool your home and/or reduce electricity consumption last summer.<blockquote></blockquote>


4. Homeowner's insurance will depend on if you are in an SFR vs attached condo. It will also depend on your policy limits any special add-ons like jewelry. Just look in the online yellow pages and call someone for a quote. That will be a more accurate estimate.<blockquote></blockquote>


5. CA has a yearly licensing fee that is based on the value of the car. <a href="https://mv.dmv.ca.gov/FeeCalculatorWeb/index.jsp">See here.</a> At some point you <em>may</em> be required to add anti-smog equipment to your vehicle, but I don't know the details on that. Poke around on the DMV website to try to find it. As for insurance, you can check online with Geico for a sample quote. I would highly recommend getting the max amount of liability possible and adding uninsured coverage.<blockquote></blockquote>


6. If you are in an SFR and love a green lawn, your water rates will kill you. <a href="http://www.irwd.com/AboutIRWD/budget.php">Here</a> is the info on the water rates.<blockquote></blockquote>


Do a google search for the Irvine city website. On it you will find a section called "New to Irvine." That will provide you with contact info for many of the basic services (trash, water, cable, etc.) that you will need, and you can better find out expense info for your situation.
 
CA is no longer charging an impact fee for cars brought-in from other states. They stopped in 1999.



The annual license fee is .65% of the purchase price with 10% knocked-off per year for depreciation.
 
Eff - Even though they no longer charge the impact fee, at some point when you get your car's license renewed, you have to have a smog check (every four or five years, I think). If the car is from out of state, is the smog check waived?
 
Last I heard, it's not waived. The car must be smogged upon initial CA registration, regardless of age (unless it meets the old car exemption -- 1975 I think).
 
eff, I just brought a car in from out of state 2 years ago. They made me smog it, have it inspected at DMV * AND * they tried to charge be about 2K because I had only purchased it 10 months prior (out of state)....and the dealer paperwork indicated that I had not paid sales tax (which I did but the dealership screwed up the final paperwork).



The car was a 2001 Jetta only worth 10K, so no way was I going to pay 2K to register it here ! I tried explaining the mistake to a boss at DMV, called the old dealership to send me revised paperwork....nope, wouldn't do it. The problem arose b/c I traded a car in, that was more expensive than the car I bought....so I actually got a decent sized check BACK from the dealership....so they got lazy with the paperwork and wrote a lot of zeros in places there shouldn't have been zeros.



No pleading helped my case, so I walked out of the DMV and drove to a VW dealership. There, I promptly bought a new VW and traded in the out of state car.



2000 bucks. I don't <em>think</em> so.
 
<strong>5) Is there a car excise tax in California? Any estimates on auto insurance rates for good drivers with cheap (sub $20,000) cars?</strong>



I moved to Irvine last summer from Wisconsin but just got around to registering my car and getting my license a couple weeks ago. I did have to get a smog test and passed it with flying colors, no special equipment needed. You do this at a service station that offers it and they give you the paperwork to deliver to the DMV.



The California DMV website has a calculator that allows you to figure out what the car registration is going to cost you. California law dictates that you register your car within 10 days of arrival in the state (because, you know, it's not like you'll have anything else to do, such as unpack, after moving yourself across the country). If you miss the deadline, they'll add a penalty. My penalty was $30. Also, you have to take the written test for the license. The 95-page motorist's handbook is on the website and you will want to read it because there are some different traffic laws here.



The DMV website also has a deal where you can schedule an appointment. I did that for the Costa Mesa DMV office. There are no signs when you walk in directing you to somewhere other than the long line of other people at the information desk. A DMV staff member finally came by and announced that people with appointments should go to the side counter, which sped things up considerably. I did the whole she-bang (car registration, written driver license test, complete paperwork for license, get license plates, have car checked by a DMV staffer) in less than 1.5 hours.



I switched my auto insurance a couple weeks after arriving...it increased about $75 annually. Much less than I feared, but I still have homeowner's insurance on my house in Wisconsin, so I receive discounts for multiple policies and your experience may not be the same. I also live 4 blocks from my office so I don't have to drive a lot, which also works to keep my rate down.





<strong>2) Home Gas bills: Here our range and dryer is electric. It appears to be gas there most of the time. However, I doubt there is much of a heating season.</strong>



The only time I've had to use the heat was when I left the windows open too long into the evening. If you're used to cold weather, there is almost no reason to ever turn the heat on out here.





<strong>3) Electric Bills: Not sure how bad these get in the summer.</strong>



I think this might depend on how far inland you go (further inland = hotter). I'm near UCI and my bill was never more than $80 last summer, even though it was (in my opinion) hotter than all get-out in July and August (which everyone told me was unusual).
 
[quote author="Trooper" date=1208172027]eff, I just brought a car in from out of state 2 years ago. They made me smog it, have it inspected at DMV * AND * they tried to charge be about 2K because I had only purchased it 10 months prior (out of state)....and the dealer paperwork indicated that I had not paid sales tax (which I did but the dealership screwed up the final paperwork).



The car was a 2001 Jetta only worth 10K, so no way was I going to pay 2K to register it here ! I tried explaining the mistake to a boss at DMV, called the old dealership to send me revised paperwork....nope, wouldn't do it. The problem arose b/c I traded a car in, that was more expensive than the car I bought....so I actually got a decent sized check BACK from the dealership....so they got lazy with the paperwork and wrote a lot of zeros in places there shouldn't have been zeros.



No pleading helped my case, so I walked out of the DMV and drove to a VW dealership. There, I promptly bought a new VW and traded in the out of state car.



2000 bucks. I don't <em>think</em> so.</blockquote>


Nice job troop. When I brough my mush-stang over I got the stink eye too. Being it had ALOT of completely different parts in the engine, transmission, suspension, etc. etc. etc. etc. I had to get it tech-inspected. Thankfully I had a mountain of paper work and everything washed ok. I even passed smog! How that! for a 600hp car.



A good Cost Of Living calculator will give you a good idea. The expensive thing right now is gas and driving.... So be sure to live close to where you want to work.



-bix
 
[quote author="Schlotkins" date=1208129062]My wife and I are moving to Irvine from the east coast. I'm tryng to get some cost estimate numbers to put in our budget so I was hoping some people could help out. Assume we have a standard 2,000 sq ft home in Irvine, probably on the older construction side. (please avoid the buy vs. rent discussion - thank you.)</blockquote>


Since you are buying, you may want to add the $5,000 to $7,000 a month you are going to lose in equity evaporation for the first few years.
 
Thank you everyone for the responses. I know real estate is going to decline more and I'm going to do my best to get us to wait, but that is probably easier said than done. If I could find a nice home rental, that would be helpful. However, I have a feeling the private rental market is almost exclusively floplords.
 
[quote author="Schlotkins" date=1208300965]Thank you everyone for the responses. I know real estate is going to decline more and I'm going to do my best to get us to wait, but that is probably easier said than done. If I could find a nice home rental, that would be helpful. However, I have a feeling the private rental market is almost exclusively floplords.</blockquote>


Just depends, If you guys can squeeze into a small place for a few months you could probably target a certain area and work it to find what you want. (this is what i'm doing and I've found some nice NEW places that will probably be going for 300-400k less than what they were asking....)



anyways good luck

-bix
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top