Real Estate Missing in First Measure ULA Committee Meeting

Buckle up as the fight over Los Angeles’ so-called mansion tax gets rowdy.

With Friday’s initial meeting of the city’s Ad Hoc Committee on Measure United to House Los Angeles, the three-person group could very well pave the way for amendments to the contentious 2022 ballot measure.

What shape those possible changes could take is anyone’s guess. However, proponents of the tax came in hot in the leadup to Friday’s meeting, casting any changes as “giveaways to developers,” in the words of United to House LA Coalition, one of a number of special interest groups involved in the fight.

Other groups, such as the Housing Action Coalition, are calling for reforms that would address the tax’s impact on housing construction.

Measure ULA passed in a citywide vote in 2022 and hiked property transfer taxes on all real estate that sells for more than $5 million in the City of LA. It put the rate at 4 percent for sales of $5 million to $10 million, and at 5.5 percent on sales over $10 million.

Residential agents and commercial real estate brokers have long complained about the tax’s chill on dealmaking and new construction. Those perspectives did not make it into the public comment period of Friday’s meeting leaving the committee to largely chew on the thoughts of tenant and housing advocacy groups.

Lights, camera, action

It was off to the races this past Monday as the city’s first mayoral debate came and went.

Incumbent Mayor Karen Bass sat out taking the stage with Council Member Nithya Raman, housing advocate Rae Chen Huang and entrepreneur Adam Miller.

The trio seized on her absence given the moderators used it to kick off the evening by asking each how they’d show up for their city. Raman didn’t hesitate as the first to field the question: “If I’m elected mayor, I won’t hide in my mansion. I will come out and talk to communities as we’ve done in our council office, as we’ve been getting wins around things like renters’ rights, around housing production.”

So, what’s the Bass campaign strategy?

She leads the pack with 25 percent of likely voters backing her, per a Los Angeles Times-University of California, Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies poll released this month. Raman came in second at 17 percent, despite a last-minute decision to enter the fray, and Spencer Pratt wasn’t far behind at 14 percent.

Perhaps the mayor’s schedule this past week offered a hint at the game plan, which seems focused on nuts-and-bolts issues over sweeping concepts. It included a visit to a Koreatown restaurant to support state legislation to stop organized metal theft, a plan to replace as many as 60,000 city streetlights with solar power, and naming David Hanson interim Los Angeles Department of Water and Power general manager.

Raman seizes on housing

Nithya Raman hit right on some major developer pain points when she released a multi-pronged strategy just a couple days after the mayoral debate.

She announced to the media on Wednesday a plan to triple the number of homes being built each year within the city if she were to become mayor. That would be accomplished with a promise to permit projects in compliance with existing building codes in 60 days or less, cutting down the number of inspectors assigned to a development to one and incentivize office-to-residential conversions with cuts to fees among several other tactics.

What Pratt said

And just because Spencer Pratt was missing in action at the debate (he was invited) didn’t mean he stayed out of the past week’s housing conversation.

“Karen Basura and Nithya Raman are blocking housing with their dysfunctional permitting nightmare,” Pratt wrote this past week on Instagram.

The former “The Hills” cast member and Palisades resident said he wants to work with individuals such as developer Rick Caruso “to make sure homes and businesses are built quickly.”

Big deal in a quiet market

Coldwell Banker Realty’s Jade Mills closed up a tidy $30.3 million sale in Beverly Hills Flats to make for one of Los Angeles County’s priciest deals so far this year.

It’s been a quiet 2026 with blockbuster trades hard to come by.

If we’re only counting on-market properties, Mills’ listing at 804 North Elm Drive of Windsor Healthcare founder Lee Samson’s now former home so far sits in the No. 1 spot for Beverly Hills.

The mystery buyer, which had no brokerage representation and was managed by Mills, picked up quite the spread at nearly 19,500 square feet. There are seven bedrooms and 15 bathrooms within the hand-carved limestone mansion.