Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has proposed a new version of a popular home-buyer tax-credit extension. Folks close to the matter claim a vote on the proposal is coming shortly.
Another recent Senate alternative would continue the $8,000 credit for four months and then gradually phase it out after that. Current law has the credit expiring at the end of November.
The value of the credit would drop by $2,000 every quarter until it halted completely by the end of 2010.
The National Association of Realtors supports the extension of the credit though at least the first two quarters of 2010 to assure that recent new home sales is firmly on a recovery track. They claim that home-buying activity in that six-month period could be crucial for new stability in the housing market again.
On the contrary, the Reid proposal wouldn’t be nearly as effective at stimulating home sales, Mr. Salvant said, because it would start winding down during the second quarter.
The debate comes as a Treasury auditor revealed this week that the Internal Revenue Service improperly issued millions of refunds related to the credit.
At a House panel hearing this week, an IRS official said it is reviewing 100,000 returns to determine if credits were paid appropriately. Given the popularity of the credit, however, experts say the allegations are unlikely to derail the push to extend it in some form.
Spurred on by the credit home sales have been recovering nicely in the past six months. On Friday home sales were report to jump significantly in September. Existing home sales rose 9.4 percent. The West was the strongest region, up 13.0 percent. In an extremely encouraging sign, supply on the market fell back sharply — down 7.5 percent in the month. Supply is now at its lowest level in 2-1/2 years.
Q3 earnings continue to impress, major firms are surprising to the upside, and markets are continuing their break-neck bounce. With second half growth coming on strong, an extension of the tax credit can mean nothing but good news for the 2010 housing market.
The extension of the home buyer $8,000 credit is a pathetic and stupid continuation of a pathetic and stupid law. Proposed by who? Oh yeah, the pathetic and stupid Harry Reid and company. Just like the clunker program stole money from non-car buyers and gave it to car buyers, and stole future sales to overstate the real demand for vehicles, the home buyer credit steals from non-home buyers and puts it in the pocket of buyers. The present sales are not real demand, but demand partially stolen from the future. When the credit goes away, the real demand will be lower than it otherwise would have been. The houses have already been bought. The benefits are a mirage, a stupid mirage only believed by stupid people.
I am sorry for the rudeness, but someone has to tell the emperor he has no clothes. My son bought a house and got the credit. I am happy for him that he was able to pay less for his house, but he stole that money from me and all other Americans. It is still wrong, wrong, wrong.
What is the National Association of Realtors, some unbiased group of beneficent people only interested in helping the beleaguered taxpayer? Of course not. They are a politically powerful group of greedy, self -serving scoundrels eager to get their hands on commissions on sales artificially boosted by $8,000. They are not the kind of disinterested, fair advisors you should trust as a source of impartial opinion.
There is no such thing as a free lunch. The $8,000 stolen from taxpayers is no longer in the hands of the taxpayers to buy, save or invest as they see fit. The housing market was vastly overvalued in the boom, caused by the expansionary credit boom. The bust is actually the healing process from the damage caused by irresponsible monetary and fiscal policy. Until housing prices come down to the level that real people can afford to buy at real wage rates that they earn, the market will not fully recover without artificial stimulation, borrowed or stolen from other markets and individuals.