The suggestion that we find alternatives to buying won't sit well with real estate agents and builders. Though the tax credits made a dent in the supply, there are still a lot of houses for sale - and still not many buyers.
Traditionally, summer is a slow time, and the tax credits pushed a lot of people who might have bought houses now to buy them in late winter and spring instead.
In an e-mail, reader Doug Waymer of Chalfont went as far as to suggest that the credits were "a costly taxpayer handout to folks who were already going to buy a home," resulting in "no improvement to the housing market."
The tax credits simply stole from future sales, Waymer wrote, "and with the expiration, sellers now need to lower prices." He added he had "pleaded with my sister and brother-in-law to close the deal on their Connecticut house sale April 30."
Though his kin were fine with the price they were getting, they didn't want to settle by the required deadline. "They lost their buyer and are having to paint the exterior, as well as drop their price again," he said.
Waymer makes a good point, especially when you consider that even though fixed mortgage interest rates remain below 5 percent and home prices have been reduced by short sales and foreclosures, there are relatively few real buyers out there.
In the last month or so, mortgage rates have dropped almost half a percentage point on a conventional 30-year loan.
Long & Foster vice president Art Herling says half a percent may not seem like much, but it can have a huge impact on the ability to buy a home.
