Pennsylvania Realtors® spend time with federal lawmakers

We’ve spent the week at NAR’s Legislative Meetings in Washington, D.C. representing the real estate industry and our consumers as we visit with federal lawmakers on Capitol Hill.

Your fellow Pennsylvania Realtors® met with 14 congressmen and Sen. Bob Casey throughout the week.

We discussed four key issues during our meetings:

National Flood Insurance Program – Flood insurance remains an important issue, especially for many Pennsylvania homeowners, and because the program is due to expire on July 31. We’re grateful that the House approved the 21st Century Flood Reform Act (H.R. 2874), which reforms and reauthorizes the National Flood Insurance Program for five years. At the same time, we urged Sen. Casey and Sen. Toomey’s staff to support this bill to avoid a lapse in the program. This is critical because 40,000 home sales per month are lost when homebuyers don’t have access to the NFIP. We’d also like to see support for the Flood Insurance Market Parity and Modernization Act (S. 563), which would help reduce barriers to private flood insurance.

Tax Policy – Congress has continued to address some problems with the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act passed in December, which made significant changes to the treatment of residential real estate. We specifically asked them to index the value of homeownership state and local tax incentives to future inflation. Unindexed limits in the tax law slowly steal tax benefits by failing to keep them even with the rate of inflation.

Realtors® asked that Congress eliminate the egregious marriage penalty by doubling the state and local tax deduction cap to $20,000 for joint returns.

We also urged them to support H.R. 110, the Mortgage Debt Forgiveness Act. The tax law has included a temporary provision that excludes from tax the amount of mortgage debt forgiveness in a short sale, mortgage debt restructuring, or when a debt is give in lieu of foreclosure. Two and a half million homeowners are currently vulnerable to having taxes due on phantom income at a time when they have been financially upset.

In addition, we urged Congress to maintain and extend the deduction for energy-efficient commercial buildings. The deduction was a temporary part of the tax law since 2005, but has expired this past December.

Net Neutrality Protections – Realtors® asked Congress to enact stronger legislation that would ensure the internet is open and competitive. NAR supports measures that would prohibit internet service providers from blocking, throttling or establishing paid prioritization. This is particularly important to our small businesses and our consumers.

Equal Access of Housing – And lastly, as we celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Fair Housing Act, Realtors® are taking the lead and encouraging congressmen to support H.R. 1447 and S. 1328, both of which would protect Americans from housing discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. NAR already adopted such provisions in its Code of Ethics in 2009.