[FIXED] Lot taxes seem too low

I have the same problem in a completely mod free save.  Yesterday the bills were >$18000. Following the patch, with no change to the property, the bills are $267.

@MapleSimmerThis is a feature, not a bug, they said so in the livestream. When they changed the billing system we can make sims pay less or more depending on how electricity-efficient and water-efficient the objects are, and also how much they use the objects. For example a larger TV uses more electricity than a smaller TV, and for example a broken toilet leaking water makes the water-bill going up.

But yes, I think it's too low with only §300 for the lot taxes. I would prefer if the lot taxes actually depended on what the lot costed, so that larger lots have higher lot taxes and smaller lots have lower lot taxes.

Also, I would like it if the category of other taxes would be a percentage of what the sims have earned in that week. Including the earnings of published books, licenced music etc.

Edit: I was wrong, the 300 simoleons is a bug, not a feature. See elelunicy’s comment at the top of page 2.

It's a bug. Lot taxes are supposed to be based on the lot value and the value of all objects on the lot. (As seen in the attached pic.) However, every lot shows $300 for lot taxes, even if it's a mansion.

@SqueamishNerd  The tool tip for the lot tax category indicates that part is still supposed to be "based on the value of all objects on the lot and the lot's value". 

This report is about the lot taxes themselves being too low, not about the bills in general. 🙂 The 'feature' mentioned in the live-stream should apply to things like water and power usage, and possibly the rebate calculation.  I don't know enough about how any of those three items are calculated to comment on whether or not they seem reasonable.  However, given that I am seeing a flat 300 simoleon charge for lot taxes in the majority of my households, and the lot taxes are only showing as a lower amount in a couple of households where the value is less than 20k, it appears that the lot taxes are not being calculated as described in the tool tip shown above & it seems like this issue starts once the lot values start getting a bit higher, possibly once they get higher than 20k.  

Best regards, 
Jennifer

I can confirm this bug as well - I posted on to the official Forum about this, thank you for submitting this. It's rather game-breaking for me. 

I played through my main save of a very wealthy family with a $204,000 mansion and when their bill finally came at the end of the week they owed $460.

Whereas, I played through a new save of a single sim on a small home worth $12,000 and at the end of the week, her bill was $424. 

Has to be a bug. 

off the grid houses also pays 300 kinda weird to me. if i want to live lika a jungle life and i stil need to pay stuff for notting it feels useless to be off the grid. the 300 bill in a jungle survival is weird.

Having just watched Carl's Sims Guides video on the update it appears to not be a bug.  All lots seem to have a flat tax of $300 irrespective of size of lot or worth of property.  The bills are based on how much water and power the sims use.  So my property worth over $500000 on a 64x64 lot now pays less than $500 in bills as I only have one toilet, a small fridge, and a small TV. (The property is full of expensive junk, and I'm fixing it up.)

@Flockleader Did you look at the screenshots above? The tooltip says that lot taxes are based on the value of the lot and everything on it. It's not a flat rate. It only appears that way because it's a bug. What sense would it make for every lot to only pay $300? The utilities hardly add up to anything. Lot taxes is where the majority of the bill comes from. Or would come from, if it were working properly.

Let's not forget that they told us that bills would roughly be the same. $18,000 is not even close to $267. They even said in the livestream that lot value is still used to help calculate bills. The bug is present even in the livestream, but they either didn't notice or ignored it.

I'm a rotational player with families at many levels of wealth, so I can confirm that the Lot Taxes are only 300 simoleons across properties that range from 13,121 (though with items in sims' inventories) to 467,847. I also started a brand new save in Evergreen Harbor to test things out. The Lot Taxes were 300 simoleons for not only my new sim in his starter but also every single Maxis premade family.

In my (old) rotational save, none of the families have the new power/water generating items yet, so these should not be a factor. Some of them have the "Frugal" reward trait and two families live in tiny homes, and these give appropriate credits in the "Tax Breaks & Penalties" section of the bills breakdown. 

I do use mods, but I also tested taking out my mods folder and clearing my cache, which still resulted in 300 simoleon Lot Taxes across the board. (And of course I am only using mods that are updated or confirmed safe.)

I assume this is a bug not only due to the fact that the hover tooltip tells us the lot taxes are affected by item/lot value, but also because it completely negates the main gameplay draw of apartments in the pack that finally gives us new apartments. If my lot taxes are only 300 simoleons on even the most massive and expensive lots, why on earth would I choose to limit my ability to build, garden, and use eco-items while paying a thousand+ simoleons in rent each week (plus deposit and utilities) for the "privilege"? Apartment rent should be cheaper than lot taxes in an equivalent house due to the restrictions placed on them, as it was before this patch. If this change was intended, it was ill considered and should be reassessed.

As a side note, using the thermostat does not seem to have any impact on power usage according to my limited testing. That doesn't seem to be functioning as intended either? It's a shame about these bill issues; I was very excited for the new features when they were announced.

This is a bug for sure. The game uses tax brackets to calculate lot taxes. The new update lowered the tax rate of all brackets by 0.5%. Currently property value under $20k has a tax rate of 1.5%. Between $20k and $30k it's 2.5%. And then it's 3% from $30k to $50k and 4.5% if it's over $50k.

Before the update the tax bracket calculation worked perfectly. The new update meanwhile completely botched the calculation. Here's the new function that's used to calculate lot taxes:

def _get_property_taxes(self):
    plex_service = services.get_plex_service()
    if plex_service.is_zone_an_apartment(self._household.home_zone_id, consider_penthouse_an_apartment=False):
        return 0
    billable_household_value = self._household.household_net_worth(billable=True)
    for bracket in Bills.BILL_BRACKETS:
        lower_bound = bracket.value_range.lower_bound
        if billable_household_value >= lower_bound:
            upper_bound = bracket.value_range.upper_bound
            if upper_bound is None:
                upper_bound = billable_household_value
            bound_difference = upper_bound - lower_bound
            value_difference = billable_household_value - lower_bound
            if value_difference > bound_difference:
                value_difference = bound_difference
            value_difference *= bracket.tax_percentage
            return value_difference

The problem is that value_difference in this function is returned as soon as it's calculated for the first tax bracket. Since $20000 * 1.5% = $300, all lot taxes are capped at $300 as a result. To fix this, calculate the running total instead. For example:

def _get_property_taxes(self):
    plex_service = services.get_plex_service()
    if plex_service.is_zone_an_apartment(self._household.home_zone_id, consider_penthouse_an_apartment=False):
        return 0
    property_taxes = 0
    billable_household_value = self._household.household_net_worth(billable=True)
    for bracket in Bills.BILL_BRACKETS:
        lower_bound = bracket.value_range.lower_bound
        if billable_household_value >= lower_bound:
            upper_bound = bracket.value_range.upper_bound
            if upper_bound is None:
                upper_bound = billable_household_value
            bound_difference = upper_bound - lower_bound
            value_difference = billable_household_value - lower_bound
            if value_difference > bound_difference:
                value_difference = bound_difference
            value_difference *= bracket.tax_percentage
            property_taxes += value_difference
    return property_taxes