How to Get a Tax Break on Your Bills

If you are looking to save money on your sims' bills you may want to consider enacting neighborhood action plans that give out tax breaks if you are in compliance. While not all neighborhood action plans result in a tax break, there are a few that can cut you a break. However, you want to be careful because if you fail to comply you can receive a tax penalty instead.

You can enact neighborhood action plans by gaining influence points and then spending them on votes during the voting period on neighborhood action plans to influence your sim's neighborhood. Some neighborhood action plans will send around an inspector to see if you are in compliance, and as a reward for complying you will get a tax break. This article will go over each neighborhood action plan that can get you a tax break and how to comply and take advantage of these tax breaks.

Neighborhood Action Plans

If you have the Sims 4 Eco Lifestyle expansion you have the ability to gain influence around your neighborhood and enact neighborhood action plans. Neighborhood Action Plans are initiatives that influence the direction of your neighborhood and how the sims in your neighborhood behave.

There are different types of neighborhood action plans, some are purely social such as "We wear bags" which makes all the sims in your neighborhood wear bags on their head, or "Juiced community" where everyone will be juiced almost all the time. Other neighborhood action plans focus on development of specific neighborhoods, such as the "Green initiatives" action plan only available in Evergreen Harbor which will help increase the neighborhood's green footprint and the trash will be cleaned up.

Lastly, there are neighborhood action plans that encourage certain types of energy production and appliances to be on your lot. These are the action plans that if you comply with can result in either a tax penalty or a tax break. Below I will go through each of these neighborhood action plans and how you can benefit from them.

How to enact Neighborhood Action Plans.

Neighborhood Action Plans are voted on by the entire neighborhood, and to vote you must have influence points. Voting is open from Friday at 8:00 a.m. to Monday at 6:00 p.m. each week. You can use your mailbox or community board to vote on the proposed neighborhood action plans.

When you click on your mailbox when voting is open you have the ability to select "Vote on Neighborhood Action Plan." A menu will appear with eight slots for proposed action plans, seven of the eight will already be filled in with a proposed action plan and the eighth slot allows you to choose one you would like to propose for people to vote on.

One vote cost 10 influence points, and each week you can cast as many votes as you can afford. There is no cap on the amount of influence points you can spend during one voting period. At the end of the voting period the neighborhood action plan with the most votes will win and be enacted across the neighborhood. Only one neighborhood action plan per voting period may be enacted at a time.

List of Neighborhood Action Plans that give you a tax break.

If you want to lower your bills each week, an easy way to do so is to enact one of the neighborhood action plans below, that if you are in compliance with will result in a tax break on your bills. However, it is a double edged sword, and if you ever are not in compliance you will receive tax penalty that you will be required to pay each week until you are in compliance.

If you want to know more about bills and utilities and hoe they are calculated, you can learn more in this article.

There are four different neighborhood action plans that can result in a potential tax break for your sims. Below you will find them outlined and instructions on how you can become compliance and enjoy savings on your bills each week.

Clean Energy Production

This neighborhood action plan encourages your neighborhood to start producing their own energy using clean energy alternative sources. You sim will gain influence points if they own either Solar Panels, Wind Turbines, or Dew Collectors. Once this neighborhood action plan is enacted you will have an inspector come by your sim's lot to see if they have gone out of their way to purchase any of these clean energy alternative energy sources. Owning multiple clean energy objects will result in a nice tax break and savings on your sim's utility bills as well.

If you enjoy creating your own energy and want to add some complexity to your game play you may want to consider trying the off-the-grid lot challenge. My guide will walk you through everything you need to know about going off the grid and how to manage it successfully.

Eco-Friendly Appliances

This neighborhood action plan rewards those who have gone out of their way to have eco-friendly appliances. This will require your sim to do green upgrades to your home appliances using eco upgrade parts. If you are wanting to get the tax break, it would be wise to upgrade your appliances before voting for this neighborhood action plan because the next day an inspector will come by to make sure you are in compliance with the new action plan. Failure to do so will result in a tax penalty being on your next bill.

Unlike other upgrade parts, eco upgrade parts cannot be purchased and are harder to come by. You have to either find them or fabricate them using the fabricator. However, the eco upgrade parts do allow you to do some upgrades that normally require a higher handiness skill without any handiness at all.

Solar panels can be upgraded using eco upgrade parts without having the required skill level, you can learn more about solar panels in this article.

Upcycling Initiative

This neighborhood action plan encourages your entire neighborhood to start recycling and reusing their bits and pieces to create new objects to use around the home. The day after the upcycling initiative is enacted you will have an inspector come by and make sure you are in compliance. Make sure you have a Home Recycler on your lot before the inspector comes by so you can take advantage of the tax break from the upcycling initiative.

Green Gardening

This neighborhood action plan encourages your neighborhood to start gardening. Your sims will gain influence points for gardening at their home. Once this neighborhood action plan is enacted, an inspector will come by your house to see if you are in compliance with the action plan. If you are in compliance you should expect to receive a nice tax break on your next bill. To be in compliance with the Green Gardening action plan you need either the "Mitey Mitey Home - Insect Farm" from Eco Lifestyle or the "Burtie's Bee Box" from Sims 4 Seasons included in your garden.

If you want to learn more about gardening and how your sims can get started, you can learn all the gardening basics and more in this article.

How to repeal neighborhood action plans

If you ever get tired of a particular neighborhood action plan you have the option to repeal it by getting your neighbors to sign a petition during the voting period. You can repeal a neighborhood action plan by clicking on your mailbox and select "petition to repeal neighborhood action plan," it will cost 10 influence points to start a petition. Once you start your petition you can start going around to get signatures, you will need to get 5 signatures total to successfully repeal the neighborhood action plan.

Neighborhood Action Plan Cheats

If you want to skip the steps of voting and instantly enact or instantly repeal neighborhood action plans you can hold down "shift" and click on your mailbox. You will notice new options will appear and you will have new options to either "Instant Repeal Neighborhood Action Plan (Cheat)..." or "Instant Enact Neighborhood Action Plan (Cheat)..." Once you click on these you will have a pop up menu appear and you can select any of the available options and it will instantly take effect.

If you are holding shift while clicking on your mailbox and are not seeing these options appear you may need to enable cheats. To so you will need to open the cheat bar. You can do so by holding down Ctrl+Shift+C for windows or Command (⌘)+Shift+C for Mac at the same time and a small bar will appear at the top left hand corner of the screen where you can type.

Once you have your cheat bar open you will want to type "Testingcheats True" and then enter. You should see "Cheats are enabled" come in a menu below your cheat bar. If you get this message then you have successfully enabled cheats. Once you do this, try holding the shift key down while clicking on the mailbox again and you should see the instant enact and instant repeal options.