California's wealth tax on billionaires is still just a proposal. Voters won't decide on it until November.
The billionaires it targets didn't wait around. Many have already moved across the state line into Nevada.
The vote is months away. The moves are already done.
Sergey Brin made the boldest move. Late last year he paid $42 million for a mansion in Crystal Bay.
The home sits on the Nevada shore of Lake Tahoe. It's now the priciest home on the lake.
He bought it through a new company called Alpine Bay LLC. The house sits just over the Nevada border.
That puts it out of reach of the tax California is weighing. Picture nudging your car past a line on the street to dodge a parking ticket.
Now picture that car costing $42 million and holding 13 fireplaces. Brin didn't stop at the house.
He also moved most of his California companies out of the state late last year.
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Brin isn't alone. The list also includes SpaceX investor Steve Jurvetson and AI founder Naveen Rao.
Oracle's Larry Ellison joined in too. He sold a $45 million San Francisco home ahead of the proposed tax.
The trend is clear. Money is heading east to Nevada.
Local brokers say the rush shows up in the price tags. Homes selling for $20 million or more near Incline Village have hit four so far this year.
At the same point in 2025, that count was zero. The jump has been that fast.
Rao moved his family into a $20 million mountain home. He said the tax would wipe out his startup, since he doesn't hold the cash to pay it.
The plan is a one-time 5% tax. It would hit the net worth of Californians worth more than $1 billion.
It would reach assets like businesses, stocks, art and patents. But it would spare real estate and pensions.
There's a catch that explains the early exits. The tax would apply to anyone who lived in the state at the start of 2026.
So leaving now is the only clean way out. A capital gains tax is different, since you pay that only when you sell.
This tax would hit what people already own. Brin compared it to the Soviet socialism his family fled in 1979.
He has since put $57 million into a group fighting it.
Even the threat of this tax is reshaping a quiet lake town. The proof is in the sales, which keep stacking up before any vote.
The bill itself wouldn't come due until 2027. And it could be paid over five years.
So the math still favors moving early.
Whether California passes it in November almost doesn't matter to the people who already left.
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