Wouldn't that just be straight up fraud?

They just bought the land for $5.4 million, that was clearly the actual value.

Probably, and the IRS does prosecute sometimes (https://www.irs.gov/compliance/criminal-investigation/two-ta...), but they've already been understaffed for years and it's obviously gotten a lot worse this year.

▲

jandrese 4 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Yeah, but the government would have to prove it in court, which is hard and takes a long time. As long as there are a bunch of other people doing it chances are you will die of old age before law enforcement does anything about it. Lots of rich people crime works this way. Make it hard enough to prosecute and you can get away with it, especially when you can afford to hire good lawyers.

▲

JadeNB 4 days ago | parent [-]

> Yeah, but the government would have to prove it in court, which is hard and takes a long time.

Isn't this "undeveloped in perpetuity" status an application, so that you have to request an agreement to your valuation and the government has to approve it, meaning that the burden of proof goes the other way from your comment? At least, for my personal residence where I have the opposite incentive, it's not that I can go to the local government with a valuation of $3.50 for my house and they have to prove it's not; I can object to their valuation and try to prove my case, but the burden is on me, not on them.

	▲	4 days ago \| parent [-]
		[deleted]

▲

bix6 4 days ago | parent | prev [-]

O you think the IRS exists to prosecute rich people for creating money out of thin air? No they are focused on withholding from the underpaid “unskilled” workers who messed up their taxes thanks to TCJA.