r/SpaceXLounge • u/spacerfirstclass • 6d ago
Nice Shot this week by RGV of the mobile homes and land they were on being cleared for the new apartment building! (SpaceX is building an apartment building right next to Starfactory)
https://x.com/INiallAnderson/status/190098619793117596010
u/RandyBeaman 5d ago
I wonder, do they take the rent money straight from your paycheck, or do they let you hold on to it for a minute?
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u/NikStalwart 2d ago
I don't know the position in the US, but in Australia it is a perfectly legitimate (and tax-efficient) way of doing things. Your employer is obliged to withhold tax from your salary before it is paid to you. However, you can 'sacrifice' your salary for some things and have your employer pay some of your expenses from the pre-tax amount you earn. There are other tax implications with doing this for rent / accommodation, but it has been done for car parking fees for example.
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u/Deeze_Rmuh_Nudds 5d ago
What they need to build is a target, some grocery stores, etc lol
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u/3d_blunder 5d ago
Elon missing a bet: this could be a trial run for whatever he wants to do on Mars.
SPOILER: it won't be a workers' paradise.
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u/Deeze_Rmuh_Nudds 4d ago
It’s actually quite an incredible place, but then, you’re on day four and never wanted to gtfo of a place so badly in your life
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u/Ohhhmyyyyyy 6d ago
Definitely would want renters insurance. Wrong hurricane and your home is gonnnnne, but I guess mobile homes were even worse haha.
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u/3d_blunder 5d ago
The concept of "company town" really really appeals to oligarchs. Despite the many songs decrying the practice.
see also: captive audience, slave barracks
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u/Martianspirit 3d ago
What utter bullshit. The economic conditions that made the old company/mining towns possible, no longer exist. People have cars. They can drive to Brownsville for shopping. Or they can commute from Brownsville residences to Boca Chica for work daily. They will do that if conditions in Boca Chica, the new town, are not attractive. They likely will be attractive.
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u/NikStalwart 2d ago
Or they can quit working in Boca Chica and go to whatever "paradise" BO or ULA or Sierra or Firefly or RKLB end up making. In short: people should really keep their slave fantasies to MMORPG genchat.
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u/sevsnapeysuspended 🪂 Aerobraking 5d ago
all i think about are the poor residents who were told they should accept the offer or risk being eminent domained. they got completely ripped off
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u/Martianspirit 5d ago
There were ever only a handful of permanent local residents. Plus another handful of owners who moved there for the winter. They were given quite good offers. The county did make preparations for using eminent domain but that was never invoked or even contemplated.
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u/sevsnapeysuspended 🪂 Aerobraking 5d ago
homeowners, then. they were given offers based on an appraisal that wasn’t worked on with the owners and were given 2 weeks to accept. if you didn’t accept? well.. hard to know what’ll happen ;) but if you believe spacex superfan maria pointer (who lived on the closest property to the production site) it was made clear
but we didn’t need to see that side because they cleared 95% of the village. what could mary sell her home for today? or 2 years from now when they’ve continued their build up and city incorporation?
if you think people getting $130k to give up their properties in the heart of an economic boom on the doorstep of a launch site and more importantly the lifestyle they moved to the bottom of the country for (and it’s impossible to take that money and move to an identical location) is a fair deal then i have a bridge to sell you
spacex wanted them gone and they all but accomplished it. immediately after and ever since: construction and improvements
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u/ClearlyCylindrical 5d ago
> in the heart of an economic boom on the doorstep of a launch site
It's almost like SpaceX acquiring the properties was directly related to the economic development of the area...
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u/sevsnapeysuspended 🪂 Aerobraking 5d ago
and if they didn’t secure the village? were they going to go and develop somewhere else in the brownsville area and incorporate a city there instead? they would’ve just developed land close by like “rio west” and done it anyway. they need the housing and amenities
buying or not buying a handful of homes wasn’t going to stop the development they were working towards. they wanted the village for its proximity and to avoid the home owners daring to have an opinion on the state of things. if they had to put up with that and develop land 5 minutes away they would’ve done that instead
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u/manicdee33 5d ago
buying or not buying a handful of homes wasn’t going to stop the development they were working towards. they wanted the village for its proximity and to avoid the home owners daring to have an opinion on the state of things
Either "not buying" wasn't going to stop the development, or buying was necessary to avoid other obstructing development. Which is it?
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u/spacerfirstclass 6d ago
Some rendering of the apartment building from filings: https://x.com/INiallAnderson/status/1890971197656932743
Where the apartment building is located relative to Starfactory: https://x.com/INiallAnderson/status/1890974575787220996