Comments on: Should the Home Buyer Tax Credit have been Extended & Expanded? (Poll)

By: Asheville Real Estate

Asheville Real Estate — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 01:22:49 +0000

Thanks for the post. The estended credit does not seem to be having the effect intended. Time will tell but our biggest problem across the board in unemployment. Peolple can’t buy a home if they don’t have a job.

By: Jennifer K Giraldi

Jennifer K Giraldi — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 18:49:42 +0000

I vote no and here’s why. The initial tax credit was a great thing for first time buyers and brought many out who maybe were not going to buy a home. Did the home buyer credit really help the housing industry? I guess that remains to be seen. After December 31st (The end of the initial credit), my business of first time homebuyers dried up. This hasn’t been the case for only me though as many of my fellow REALTORS have expressed the same opinion. And did we really need to sink the country into more debt? I think we have had enough tax credits. How are we going to pay all this money back?

By: Wayne Pruner

Wayne Pruner — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 06:34:41 +0000

I vote yes on this one. I keep track of market statistics in the city of Tigard, Oregon and my observation has been that approximately 50% of recent sales have been in the segment usually attributed to first time home buyers. All the first time home buyers I represented indicated that the tax credit was a motivator to purchasing before the credit expired ( the first time, Nov. 30). If the job market does not improve soon, I am afraid that the number of sales will fall when the credit expires. Everyone suffers when the real estate market is floundering.
Wayne Pruner´s last blog ..Tigard OR Homes sales statistics Dec. 2009

By: Eric Steinbach

Eric Steinbach — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 17:21:52 +0000

I definitely think the market recovery will be slowed if the government doesn’t continue with this program. If mortgage rates went up even 1% I think the buyer market would dry up rather quickly.

Eric Steinbach – Eric Steinbach – Kelowna Homes

By: Debt Cancellation

Debt Cancellation — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 01:35:33 +0000

It's great that it got extended. But at the end of the day I am not sure if it will do any good. We still have hundreds of thousands of new foreclosures still coming to market. Unless something is done about this I'm not sure that we will be able to change the market.

By: landforsale

landforsale — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 18:04:45 +0000

Money could have been spent in other or better ways, but this tax credit has given a much needed boost to the market, at least in my area. Many new families have moved to my neighborhood in the last year. It was a relief to those families that have been trying to sell for a long time. A few of them mentioned how pleased they were with the tax credit being made available. I never thought of asking them if the tax credit was the real reason they bought now. But they were happy to have it. I am not sure if it’s the best way, but it seems to be helping people in Oregon.
~Jake

By: Texas Home Loan

Texas Home Loan — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 04:01:16 +0000

It treats the symptoms…. not the problems.
Money could have been spent better elsewhere.

By: micheal smith

micheal smith — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 10:56:12 +0000

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By: Stephen

Stephen — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 19:30:45 +0000

I know of at least 2 other couples where I work who have been sitting on the sidelines waiting to buy a house for over a year. One couple is still working through a short sale and fully expected to miss the deadline. The other couple was outbid on a house they liked and haven't found another one they liked enough to pull the trigger, deadline or no.
I seriously doubt the $8k credit would be the only reason someone would buy a house, but it was a real factor when we were looking at houses.
Whenever we looked at distressed properties, we knew we could consider the $8k as a part of a potential repair/renovation budget. We had saved for several years, but we still didn't have a ton of cash available to just throw at repairs after our down payment requirements were raised.
Maybe the credit didn't stabilize prices, maybe the market was just settling into it's price floor anyway, but I figured it was helping some by bringing more buyers into the market.

As for the cost, well- I don't know what to say to people upset about that. We will receive $8k to help us with our first house and I think it's a good thing. I've been paying taxes since my first job at 14 and my wife since she was 16. We are 31 and 30 respectively. The credit we will receive next year is a fraction of what we have paid in so far and a fraction of what we will continue to pay.

As for health care, I also have a different take. I'm an accountant and I've been watching our benefit expenses almost double in the past 6 years and we continue to pay more than half of the employee medical insurance. For every employee who chooses family coverage, we pay over $600 a month (the yearly premium is over $10,200). For singles we, the employer, still pay over $220 a month. These are not Cadillac plans and the coverage quality has declined each year while prices went up. I don't know how American businesses are supposed to stay competitive when all of our major foreign competitors have benefit costs at less than half of our prices if at all. The new health insurance reform plan isn't exactly what I would like, but this issue has been out of hand for several years now and needs to be addressed. If it doesn't lower costs, they will have to go back again and rewrite it.

By: Kyle

Kyle — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 02:42:16 +0000

Interesting tidbit on healthcare regarding "uninsured Americans" : of the 46 Million uninsured, 18 Million make more than $50,000 a year (about 7k over median income) and choose not to buy insurance. Of the 28 Million remaining, over 9.5 Million aren't american citizens i.e. temporary workers or foreign exchange students. so the real number is closer to 18 Million americans, who make less than $50,000. interesting stat mainstream media doesn't tend to look into very much.
http://www.census.gov/prod/2009pubs/p60-236.pdf pag 28