1.4% mall improvement fee

[Sunshine State Sue]

Last year, a hail storm came through Denver around the time we were visiting our ds.  The damage was amazing.  The mall was closed for 6 months for repairs.  Now, besides the 7.51% sales tax, there is a 1.4% "improvement" fee.  Have you ever heard of such a thing?

[cjzimmer1]

Well one of the counties in our state has a special tax to help fund the football stadium in that county so in light of that, I don't find it all that surprising.

[hjffkj]

Never heard of that. Seems crazy.

[Garga]

Basically 9% in taxes/fees on everything bought at the mall? 

I can see why they did it, I suppose.  How do repairs like that normally get paid for?  Maybe a bank wouldn’t lend them the money without a plan for how’d they’d pay the bank back.  Aren’t malls getting harder to sustain in the world of Amazon?   Lenders might not be so willing to lend to malls anymore.

I’ve never seen it done.  The only place I’ve seen extra fees like that is for something like a “utility fee” at a hotel.  I think we paid some sort of extra water fee when we stayed in Las Vegas one year.  And airlines are notorious for all their little fees.  But I’ve not heard of any fees for repairing a building.  But I live in a tiny corner of the world, and just because I’ve not seen it doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.  : )

[Garga]

13 minutes ago, cjzimmer1 said:

Well one of the counties in our state has a special tax to help fund the football stadium in that county so in light of that, I don't find it all that surprising.

How does that work?  If you buy anything in that county, you pay a higher tax than if you go to the adjoining county to buy something?  

[cjzimmer1]

17 minutes ago, Garga said:

How does that work?  If you buy anything in that county, you pay a higher tax than if you go to the adjoining county to buy something?  

Exactly this.  I live far enough away that I'm not really affected by it but yeah I think it's nuts.  But then I don't like sports so I'd be just fine if they ripped the whole stadium down. 

[Ailaena]

I don’t think it has anything to do with the storm since there are multiple locations in the city that have this fee http://www.lakewood.org/PIF/  

Interesting to me that the fee is subject to sales tax and funny how many little things like this many of us never notice.  

[Carrie12345]

I'm not certain I follow completely.  1.4% fees taxed on income, or taxed on individual purchases?  Because I've definitely seen improvement fees levied (or discussed being levied) taken through additional income tax. but I've not heard of it being taken through tax on purchases.  

(In our very large private development, we have the ability to add a capital improvement fee to our dues.  There's nothing for sale here except for tickets to the occasional dinner or holiday party! That's the only way I learned about improvement fees.)

[Sunshine State Sue]

2 hours ago, Carrie12345 said:

 

 

7 hours ago, cjzimmer1 said:

Well one of the counties in our state has a special tax to help fund the football stadium in that county so in light of that, I don't find it all that surprising.

I lived in the Dallas Fort Worth area when they built the TAXUS Rangers baseball stadium.

7 hours ago, Garga said:

Basically 9% in taxes/fees on everything bought at the mall? 

I can see why they did it, I suppose.  How do repairs like that normally get paid for? 

Yes.  A fee based on everything bought at the mall.  I would think they are paid for by insurance, but we speculate that they were underinsured.

6 hours ago, Ailaena said:

I don’t think it has anything to do with the storm since there are multiple locations in the city that have this fee http://www.lakewood.org/PIF/  

Interesting to me that the fee is subject to sales tax and funny how many little things like this many of us never notice.  

Fascinating!

2 hours ago, Carrie12345 said:

I'm not certain I follow completely.  1.4% fees taxed on income, or taxed on individual purchases?

Yes.  1.4% fee on purchases.

[Katy]

Only in the Denver area.  Once when I lived out there for a summer nanny job in college I had carefully budgeted a certain amount for whatever it was I needed and chose my purchases based on that budget.  Only to find out there was a state tax, a county tax, a city tax, a mall parking tax, and a mall improvement fee.  The unexpected taxes made everything cost 20% more than I thought it would!  That was in the late 90's.  I think it was a mall in or near Littleton.

[Lanny]

Is that the Malls "unoffical" tax imopsed on sales there or is it approved by a city or county?

[Katy]

9 minutes ago, Lanny said:

Is that the Malls "unoffical" tax imopsed on sales there or is it approved by a city or county?

 

No idea.

[Farrar]

Way to drive more business to Amazon and Wal-mart and other big online retailers.

A mall is a business place. If you can't pay for it and make it competitive, then charging your customers more than other locations likely isn't going to be a winning strategy.

[Bluegoat]

I've seen it in other settings.  Airports, especially.

A mall seems odd.  I'd normally expect them to jack up the rents a little, and then the retailers would reflect that in their pricing.  I wonder why they would do it that way?  

[Lanny]

That mall should have purchased better insurance, before this happened. Insurance to repair the damage. Business interruption insurance.  Those customers who live nearby may continue to patronize stores there, but others, with a choice, will spend their money somewhere else. That mall has horrible management.

[Bluegoat]

Insurance won't cover norma upgrades though.  Malls have a lot of infrastructure that has to be maintained and improved, even without a natural disaster.

[MysteryJen]

Colorado does a lot of little special taxes- everything needs to be approved by the taxpayer. Usually, they are not permanent. Off the top of my head, there was a tax for the Rockies stadium and I am currently paying separate little taxes in my country and city for watershed improvements, flood damage repair, etc.  

It was pretty terrible what happened to the mall-so many workers were affected and it really killed city revenues over there.

[Lady Florida.]

12 hours ago, Sue in St Pete said:

 Have you ever heard of such a thing?

Actually yes, right here in our state. I'm on the east coast and while it's uncommon it's starting to pop up here and there. 

West Melbourne - I remember when this first came to light and people were complaining and saying they wouldn't shop there. The mall is too far from me to bother going and there aren't any stores I can't get to with a shorter trip, but as far as I know it's still a thriving shopping center. 
Same plaza, different story
Volusia County, shopping centers and outlet malls

Most of the time they're private fees imposed by the owner or developer.

From the third link: 

The new shopping and entertainment complex across from Daytona International Speedway is one of only a handful in the state — but the third in Volusia County — to tack on such fees, which can reap millions of dollars for their owners over a span of some 100 years. Experts say it could be a growing trend.

There’s nothing in the law that prohibits the extra fees — any property owner can impose one, said Mark Watts, a Cobb Cole attorney who has represented the developers at all the local complexes. And the fees are not a tax, though a local circuit court judge had to rule that was so in one case.

The fees are “privately imposed,” Watts said. “You can’t have a tax if there is no government action.”

It’s difficult to say how many others within Florida are tacking on similar charges. A search of Google and other news libraries found mentions of only three other shopping centers in Florida that impose similar fees: Celebration Pointe in Gainesville, Ravaudage in Winter Park, and Hammock Landing in West Melbourne.

11 hours ago, Garga said:

 

I’ve never seen it done.  The only place I’ve seen extra fees like that is for something like a “utility fee” at a hotel. 

Many Florida counties and some individual cities have what's known as a tourist tax. It's an extra tax added on to hotel and motel bills. This is above the regular state and local sales tax.

11 hours ago, Garga said:

How does that work?  If you buy anything in that county, you pay a higher tax than if you go to the adjoining county to buy something?  

Yes. Florida has a base state sales tax of 6%. Cities and counties can add on to that. In my county it's 7%, which is fairly common. 

https://www.salestaxhandbook.com/florida/rates

[4everHis]

On 5/14/2018 at 12:29 AM, Garga said:

How does that work?  If you buy anything in that county, you pay a higher tax than if you go to the adjoining county to buy something?  

In our state you must pass a millage during a voting campaign to charge this tax. The people vote on whether they approve of this "added" tax amount that is paid in their property tax each year. It's not randomly added.