How the tax bill potentially will affect homeowners

This past weekend, the GOP passed its tax plan along party lines, despite heavy opposition against it in CA. I was wondering how the new plan might affect homeowners, and my friend Jay Vorhees at JVM Lending had the perfect answer. See his summary below!

The bill has a provision to cap the mortgage interest deduction to loan amounts of $500,000 or less. To be clear, borrowers will not be ineligible for the mortgage interest deduction if they owe more than $500,000; borrowers will only be able to deduct interest that accrues against $500,000 of their mortgage, no matter how large it is. Here are some observations:

1. Only 5% of all mortgages are over $500,000. And the vast majority of them are in California. Hence, it is unlikely that we Californians will get a lot of sympathy from middle America. But this also explains why there is so much concern in California.

2. How much will it actually hurt borrowers? For a $1 million home (not a lot in coastal California) with 20% down, a borrower will have an $800,000 mortgage. This means that $300,000 of that debt will be ineligible for the mortgage interest tax deduction. If the interest rate is 4%, the borrower will not be able to deduct $12,000 of interest from his or her income for tax purposes. If that same borrower is in a 40.5% combined tax bracket (33% Federal, and 7.5% State), he or she will lose $4,860 in direct tax savings. That is real money for anyone.

3. Current borrowers will be grandfathered, meaning they will be able to continue to deduct interest against a $1 million mortgage (or $1.1 million if they have an equity line). This provision will likely hurt inventory, as this will create another disincentive to sell.

4. Standard Deduction Doubling: This is the bigger issue for real estate in general, as most lenders and Realtors aggressively sell the tax benefits from buying a house. If the Standard Deduction for married couples doubles to $24,000, most taxpayers will not be eligible to take advantage of the mortgage interest deduction (it would only make sense if their mortgage interest and other itemized items exceeded $24,000; a $500,000 loan at 4% would only accrue $20,000 of interest).

5. The real estate lobby is extremely powerful. This is the biggest factor of all. The real estate lobby (that includes builders) is exceptionally powerful, and most of the lobby is opposed to the above-referenced provisions.

I always find Jay’s perspectives insightful with helpful information. Jay wrote this prior to the bill being passed by the Senate. Now that it has been passed, here are a few of my own observations:

There is a lot of jockeying of blame between the two parties (status quo).
If it was so negative, why did the Senate Bill get passed so quickly?
The Senate and House will now go back and forth on all the details to get final approval before it goes to President Trump. Changes can still be made or it could possibly fall apart.
Back to Jay’s last point – there is a very strong lobby that still can push change.
I see this continues creating a disincentive for people to sell. It used to be that on average people moved every 7 years; that number has now increased to approximately every 20 years, thus the continued low inventory.

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Owners have the largest mortgages in history!

It’s no secret that the housing market has been unbalanced over the past few years. Prices have been rising, and with them, so have average home loans.

According to The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA), the average home loan size is the largest its been in the history of its survey, which began in 1990.

Additionally, the median mortgage size was only about 3.3 times the median annual income in 1990 – now, it’s more than 5 times as big. This is likely due to the increase in housing prices, buyers getting bigger homes and lower interest rates over the years.

Here’s a look at some housing market characteristics for select years.

Housing market data points — Courtesy Realtor.com (link in text above)

According to Mike Ervin of Supreme Lending, people are just waiting and waiting for mortgage rates to go down. People who are using securitizers like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have to wait until the Fed buys up more mortgage bonds so that rates will go down. It is unknown if that will happen, but rates have dropped in 2017.

Multiple factors can affect the bond and mortgage markets. The most recent major event was the Trump election and presidency, which saw a large immediate increase in mortgage rates, which have since rebounded, even with the Fed raising rates.

In California, we are in the wealth-building business and real estate in the Bay Area is going to be a good investment for years to come. I am here to advise, provide insight and help you build wealth through real estate.

Will the Presidential race affect our mortgage rates?

I thought this might be interesting to share. Traditionally, there is very little on the market as we enter the holiday season. The last couple years, sellers listing in December and the beginning of January tended to have multiple offers because there isn’t much inventory (meaning, people don’t like to have Open Houses or showings during the holiday season as they are usually entertaining family or friends).

With the Presidential election around the corner, many agents are getting the feel the market has softened. It will be interesting to see how this year’s election will affect our market. Here are some insights from my friend Jay Vorhees at JVM Lending:

Trump = Lower Rates; Clinton = Same or Higher Rates

We have blogged several times about how rates are not held artificially low prior to major elections. It is a myth that they are. Presidents, in fact, like to see proof that the economy is getting stronger, and these signs usually push rates higher. Presidents hope for positive signs like GDP growth, job growth, lower unemployment, etc. These signs usually push investors into stocks and out of bonds, causing rates to go up.

(Quick reminder: When investors demand more stocks, rates go up; when investors demand more bonds, rates go down.)

With respect to Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, it is all about “stability.” Stock market investors like “stability” as much as they like growth. Worries about instability or shakeups send investors away from stocks and into the safety of bonds (pushing rates down).

Investors believe that Clinton will follow President Obama’s course, and this is perceived as “stability.” So, signs that Clinton might win will probably keep investors in stocks, which will ultimately keep rates largely the same.

Investors are not sure what Trump might do, so signs that Trump might win will probably push investors to the safety of bonds, pushing rates lower.

This is very similar to the uncertainty the Brexit vote created and its influence in pushing rates lower.