Enzi Backs Tax Bill for 1st-time Home Buyers
Those making less than $100,000 would benefit.
Jim Stanford, Jackson Hole News&Guide
June 14,2005
U.S. Sen. Mike Enzi has cosponsored a bill that would give an additional tax deduction to first-time home buyers.
The bill, introduced last week, would allow people making less than $100,000 per year to deduct mortgage insurance premiums from their federal income taxes.
Mortgage insurance is required when a buyer cannot put down at least 20 percent of the purchase price of a home.
Enzi, R-Wyo., said in a release that families could expect to save about $200 per year, on average, if the bill is passed. Ninety-three percent of Wyoming households make less than $100,000 per year, and 52 percent of home purchase loans in the state were covered by insured mortgages in 2002, the release stated.
"Many people are forced to purchase costly mortgage insurance when they buy a home, and that isn’t generally appealing to the new home buyer," Enzi said in the release. "This bill affords people the opportunity to recover some of their money, money they can use to put gas in their cars and food on the table in their new home."
Jim Moses, market president for First Interstate Bank in Jackson, said he doubted that the bill would make a big impact. Those who don’t have the money to pay for insurance up front likely would not benefit from after-the-fact tax help, Moses said.
"It would have some impact, but it would be meager, I think," he said. "Usually people in that tax bracket are not in need of tax deductions."
Enzi was one of 17 senators to cosponsor the bill, S. 132. It has been sent for consideration to the Senate Finance Committee, whose members include Sen. Craig Thomas, R-Wyo.
Enzi has been a proponent of affordable housing. In recent years he helped secure $540,000 in federal grant money for housing in Teton County. Half of that money, administered by Teton County Housing Authority, went to down payment assistance for low-income home buyers, thereby helping them avoid buying mortgage insurance.
The Housing Authority used the other half to pay for infrastructure and engineering for low-income rental apartments on Snow King Avenue.
"We need to do everything feasible to encourage people to buy homes," Enzi said in the release. "It is good for the individual family and the community."
Anne Hayden, executive director of Jackson Hole Community Housing Trust, a private affordable housing group, said most of the trust’s home buyers do not pay mortgage insurance. Two lenders that handle affordable housing, Wyoming Community Development Authority and Fannie Mae, have loan programs that do not require mortgage insurance for low-income buyers, Hayden said.
