dll2000 Posted February 17 Share Posted February 17 19 hours ago, HuskieBear said: the land isn't worth 7 billion. property taxes aren't taxed on what company/person is there, you know that, right? Yes I know. I am not talking about value of Bears. They just bought it for 192 million and land was valued at 192 million which is what they are fighting about now. Value goes up when you put buildings on a property. Don’t get me wrong, it’s never going to be 7 billion or assessed at 7 billion. But they talked about putting 7 billion worth of stuff on that property. Point is Cook county commercial tax rate for improved land is 25%. A huge number. Something has to be figured out if there is ever going to be a Bears stadium I looked up Now Centre in Hoffman to see for comparison, but they pay 0 property taxes. 0. Interesting. They have some kind of deal. Anyone know what that is about? I will look up another commercial property later. GTG. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dll2000 Posted February 17 Share Posted February 17 So Sears left Hoffman Estates with the bag. That’s why there is no taxes on Now Arena. https://www.propublica.org/article/sears-story-day-4-centre Fascinating stuff. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sparky151 Posted February 18 Share Posted February 18 The village of Bridgeview has had similar issues with the former MLS stadium built there. I don't know all the details but the MLS team in Austin, TX privately financed their stadium, then gave it to the city. So they don't have to pay any real estate taxes as it's publicly owned. The team gets all the revenue related to soccer events and probably some from other events. The team is paying off their private mortgage with JP Morgan Chase. In the Arlington Heights context, I'm surprised a deal wasn't struck to bring the team to the city with all the zoning and infrastructure and tax changes spelled out before the team exercised their option to buy the real estate. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dafreak Posted February 21 Share Posted February 21 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dll2000 Posted February 21 Share Posted February 21 2 hours ago, dafreak said: I can’t read that. But I started reading this: https://beargoggleson.com/posts/chicago-bears-settlement-arlington-heights-board-review-school-districts-property-tax Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chisoxguy7 Posted February 21 Share Posted February 21 2 hours ago, dll2000 said: I can’t read that. But I started reading this: https://beargoggleson.com/posts/chicago-bears-settlement-arlington-heights-board-review-school-districts-property-tax Excerpt: The Chicago Bears got a preliminary split decision on their property tax appeal for the former Arlington International Racecourse Tuesday when the Cook County Board of Review proposed cutting the property’s valuation, but keeping its tax rate unchanged. The tax appeal board valued the racecourse property at $138 million, down from the $192 million market valuation by the Cook County assessor. But the board also ruled that the land should not be classified as vacant for 2023, because its grandstand was not completely demolished until December. That means the property would be assessed as a commercial property at 25% of market value, rather than the 10% for vacant land that the Bears wanted. The result is a valuation about 45% higher than the $95 million that local schools negotiated last year for the property with former owner Churchill Downs Inc. That settlement resulted in a tax of $8 million, so the new valuation would suggest a tax closer to $12 million. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HuskieBear Posted February 21 Share Posted February 21 20 minutes ago, chisoxguy7 said: Excerpt: The Chicago Bears got a preliminary split decision on their property tax appeal for the former Arlington International Racecourse Tuesday when the Cook County Board of Review proposed cutting the property’s valuation, but keeping its tax rate unchanged. The tax appeal board valued the racecourse property at $138 million, down from the $192 million market valuation by the Cook County assessor. But the board also ruled that the land should not be classified as vacant for 2023, because its grandstand was not completely demolished until December. That means the property would be assessed as a commercial property at 25% of market value, rather than the 10% for vacant land that the Bears wanted. The result is a valuation about 45% higher than the $95 million that local schools negotiated last year for the property with former owner Churchill Downs Inc. That settlement resulted in a tax of $8 million, so the new valuation would suggest a tax closer to $12 million. it's honestly a decent middle ground for both sides. hopefully this helps moves things forward, one way or the other Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dll2000 Posted February 21 Share Posted February 21 17 minutes ago, chisoxguy7 said: Excerpt: The Chicago Bears got a preliminary split decision on their property tax appeal for the former Arlington International Racecourse Tuesday when the Cook County Board of Review proposed cutting the property’s valuation, but keeping its tax rate unchanged. The tax appeal board valued the racecourse property at $138 million, down from the $192 million market valuation by the Cook County assessor. But the board also ruled that the land should not be classified as vacant for 2023, because its grandstand was not completely demolished until December. That means the property would be assessed as a commercial property at 25% of market value, rather than the 10% for vacant land that the Bears wanted. The result is a valuation about 45% higher than the $95 million that local schools negotiated last year for the property with former owner Churchill Downs Inc. That settlement resulted in a tax of $8 million, so the new valuation would suggest a tax closer to $12 million. Thank you. IMO all this is about current taxes is not that important. It is important because it is still millions, but not AS important. Bears are never going to build anything there without some knowledge of what their tax bill is going to be once they do. Nor should they. I believe Bears and Sox and both trying to take advantage of an expiring program too - not sure what that is about. Interesting stuff. I don't think it is impossible Bears leave the state entirely over all this. That would be really sad. Not sure I would stay a Bears fan if that happened. On a side note, but somewhat related, I just got off phone with a women who lives in Highland Park. She says she works remotely and doesn't go into city anymore for work because she is now afraid to and she used to all the time for both work and recreation. You can disagree with her, or say it isn't real or in her head, but that is how she feels. That is what she says she observes on walk from train station to her companies office. She probably isn't alone. She was my tech support on something. I didn't bring it up either. She did on her own. I was just wanting to talk about something to do with my software. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CBears019 Posted March 11 Share Posted March 11 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Madmike90 Posted March 11 Share Posted March 11 3 minutes ago, CBears019 said: This would be amazing if it happens. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CBears019 Posted March 11 Share Posted March 11 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dafreak Posted March 11 Share Posted March 11 1 hour ago, Madmike90 said: This would be amazing if it happens. While it might be great that the team remains in the city I think it would be a horrible decision for the franchise. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AZBearsFan Posted March 11 Share Posted March 11 This is all fascinating to me. The real headliner IMO is that if the stadium is publicly owned the Bears will not pay any annual property taxes on it. This has seemingly been the big hurdle in AH all along. From a cash flow standpoint, the Bears almost surely make less in annual revenue than they would as a sole owner, but without having to pay their $2B up front like they may have had to do for an AH stadium construction and without huge new annual tax obligations being added to their bottom line, their cash flows may actually be higher (and possibly significantly so) than they would’ve been with a full AH stadium outlay, both short term and long term. In theory they could potentially end up with more money on a year-to-year basis than now, even if it’s less than they might have with AH. We don’t know what it’s going to cost them annually to be a tenant. After contributing $2B to construct a building they won’t even own their costs on a lease may be basically zero. Imagine the negotiating power a $2B contribution toward a publicly owned facility would carry. They could ask for basically anything in return and it would have to be considered from the city’s side, right? From strictly an A —> B standpoint, the Bears getting a new stadium for which they (presumably) won’t have to pay maintenance costs, plus increased annual revenues for the Bears (by way of what will undoubtedly be a far more favorable long term lease than their current one (their $2B has to get them something) - at the immediate expense of the Arlington tear down and essentially brokering the sale of the property to other developers (probably at a net profit after all is resold), this is almost surely not a bad deal for the team. It’s just not the one we’ve expected all along since they bought the AH property. For all we know their primary goal all along might’ve been to create a highly leveraged situation with the city. It would be a shrewd business move to be planning housing and commercial development sales, etc. in AH all along while leveraging that it might be a football stadium outside the city to get the city to finally give them what they want downtown. Maybe they’ve known all along that they could purchase then tear down the track and then sell it off for a huge profit all along. Even a bad businessman would at least research that as a contingency plan should an intended stadium not happen there. No major corporation invests almost $200M on real estate without knowing that they can at least get that money back, right? Or maybe they bungled this whole thing. Lol. We won’t know anything from that end short term. Like I said - fascinating. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Madmike90 Posted March 11 Share Posted March 11 1 hour ago, dafreak said: While it might be great that the team remains in the city I think it would be a horrible decision for the franchise. Not owning the stadium is an obvious issue but for the team to remain in the city itself the revenue generated from all sorts of other events would offset some of that lose and be massive for the city itself a economy…it’s a bit of a win win where as moving to Arlington Heights was only a win for the Bears…this is how to ensure the loyalty of a fan base forever more. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dll2000 Posted March 11 Share Posted March 11 1 hour ago, dafreak said: While it might be great that the team remains in the city I think it would be a horrible decision for the franchise. I agree. I wonder about all the politics involved. They can’t move to Arlington without a tax deal from county because it’s not affordable. Arlington is still in cook county. Cook county is presumably controlled by Chicago politics. I will never know. No connections there. Not really any investigative journalists anymore. Probably more twists to story before it’s all done. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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