News reports are telling us that the Senate has agreed in principle to extend the first time home buyer tax credit, allowing it to act as an incentive to first time home buyers who go under contract by end of April, 2010 and close by end of June, 2010. They’re also working on the possibility of further extending an incentive to existing home buyers who have been in their homes at least 5 years. They maximum credit for them would be $6,500. The House had already agreed on the value of extending the tax credits. Now, the Senate is working on details of a bill to move this along. HERE is a USA Today article with additional details. So, now we’ll have some more time through the Spring of next year to see if these tax credit incentives have been an important catalyst for healing the economy or just a crutch to keep it from sinking further. It may be that the tax credit extension is the necessary bridge to a time when employers can start hiring again, since there is some evidence that the business to business spending levels are starting to increase. HERE’S some further detail in The Charlotte Observer on the state of the economy overall and predictions for recovery.
Wondering where all that government recovery money is going? You can go to http://www.recovery.gov to see.
