Delivery fee

We call that a Champagne taste on a Beer budget, except tax payers get stuck with the total bill…
Yeah Nashville has pulled that Tax increase just until X project is done and then NEVER lower it back down… Our sales tax is 9.25% now…

Several years ago the legislature in California passed a $.12 a gallon increase in the gas tax, $.20 on diesel and increased the registration fees by $25 to $175. Much screaming happened, and a group circulated a petition demanding a general vote in a proposition to repeal the tax. They got enough signatures and so we voted. And the proposition failed, by 43% in favor of cutting the tax and 57% opposed, so the tax stayed.

Now the roads are under reconstruction all over the state and there’s loud complaining about traffic disruption.

Damned if you do, and damned if you don’t. And my sales tax is 10.25%, the state income tax is the highest in the US and simple, small houses still cost more than a million dollars. And, my fellow Car Talkers, your children and grandchildren are still coming here and trying to create a life.

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I park at Walmart car service door. Walk in and auto parts is 50’ from door. It’s 500’ from front door. Car service door is rear of store. No riff raff clientele to deal with. They never stock oil filters now. They do have oil, antifreeze and other car stuff though. I ordered it online at 8pm and it was at my door at 9am. Took 13 hrs. Delivery tax is not done deal. But, I’m sure our govt will pass it.

Really? That’s weird. Every WalMart around hear has one side of an isle dedicated to Filters (oil and air). Their main filter is still Fram.

Our suburb is high end, they don’t stock much store brand oil and many filters. There is a terrible mall 8 miles away. Dead zone. Sears closed. Wards closed. Pennys closed. They tore down 1/2 of mall and built a new Walmart in 2012. Just announced they are closing Walmart. Too many police calls. Too much shoplifting.

So’s mine. Average home price is $700k+. We have a WalMart super center which includes groceries.

The closed Kmart building is 1 mile away. They had same setup. Walk thru garden center and into car section. Is a pennys now. I think they are open? Walmart #2 is 4 miles away. They don’t have auto center but do have garden center. Which is closed 1/2 the year so I can’t use that entrance. It’s 94% minority customers but I’ve never been hassled. I don’t feel threatened by Hmong or Somalis. Or Mexicans.

In my town, the long-vacant K-Mart is finally being torn down, and a condo development is going up in its place. To keep this car-related, those condos will feature… I think …~10 EV charging stations.

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Kmart=auto parts. Walmart=auto parts. Easy access. Is my drift.

When one of them was marked for closure ~10 years ago, I went there in search of some bargains on filters, fluids, and such. The auto parts area looked like a tornado had gone through it, and it was such an incredible mess that finding anything there would have amounted to a part-time job for me. I don’t need bargains that much

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We had 2 K-Marts. One shut down and became a Sears Greatland. Eventually it shut down and is now a grocery store. The grocer vacated another building in the same shopping center and it is now a Dick’s Sporting Goods. The other K-Mart is now a Walmart. Businesses come and go, but there are almost no vacancies. This includes during the pandemic. Very few restaurants closed for good.

K mart has been long gone around here for years. Wall mart and others are pulling out of high crime area like portland. I remember when k mart had ac parts, spark plugs, filters, etc. very convenient if you could stand the Carmel corn smell. I think it was over 260 ‘em stores that are being closed and chain restaurants the same way. The purpose of a business is to make money. If you can’t make money in an area, you close stores.

I guess 20 years ago, builders square (a Kmart company) was closing down. As they closed, discounts went from 20 to 30 to 40% off and the all liquidated. Bought my mower there, air nailer, grinder etc, when I wanted to buy a wire feed welder there, every one of the torches were missing. A replacement torch cost as much as the welder. When I asked what happened, the guy just shrugged and said they just came in and took them all. Still have no idea why corporate would do that but lots of weird stuff was going on there as they closed. When they loaded up my mower they threw in the $100 mulching kit and when I got home discovered they gave me two batteries. I brought one back. Guy buys a mower at 40% off but no battery for $80? The kids were just clearing the shelves.

I expect that’s the key parameter politicians look at. As long as folks keep coming to Calif, no need to change policies. I think however there’s a great deal of concern among the Calif politicians about small business’s loss of revenue over the past 5 years.

K -Mart and Sears are gone in NH. Not even sure where the closest k-Mart is.

Lampert and his back handing dealings destroyed Sears and K-Mart while making him extremely wealthy.

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The upside is buildings like that make pretty good low cost office facilities. We ran our warehouse and conference facilities in one. Not much needed outside of exterior enhancements, flooring etc. big parking lots in accessible locations and all on one level.

Here the big box stores are doing OK generally, it’s the smaller retail businesses that have almost vanished. The local clothing, shoe, housewares and decorations, bookstore, jewelers, drug stores are just about gone. When Oakland raised the minimum wage to $15 Wal-Mart locked the doors with no notice at all. One day open normal hours, the next day locked up and no one home. On the other hand the streets are congested with deliverers. Amazon drivers do not pull over to the curb at all, just stop in the street and block a lane.

I can’t even buy a suit in town anymore. I bought a couple a few years ago when a men’s store next town over was closing. Only need them for weddings and funerals anyway I guess, but kinda sad to see places that were in business for 80 years close up. Still got a shoe store anyway. Napa also has reduced their hours to like 7 instead of 9 and closed sundays. If I was still working, I’d almost need another car.

Im visiting family in Bellevue washington at the moment. The sales tax is 10.1%. Absurd.

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6.5% of that is state, The other 3.6% is city.

I live about 30 miles north of Bellevue and we are at 6.5% + 2.6% city for 9.1%

Maybe where you live. But real-estate/land is still extremely expensive here in southern NH the Boston area. Those types of properties aren’t abandoned very long here. Not enough time to rent out office space or warehouse space. Many times the buildings are just demolished for new.