Cost for 3 Oregon Homeownership Tax Breaks Expected to INCREASE by $333 Million Over Coming Biennium.

In a post earlier, I pointed out that OHCS is projected to received less than $10 million in Oregon General Fund revenue in the coming 2011-2013 biennium. I suggested that readers remember that number for a future post; this is that future post.

I have started to look at Oregon's projected state tax expenditures for the coming biennium.  My initial focus is on the three major home ownership tax expenditures: Capital gains on home sales, the property tax deduction, and the mortgage interest deduction.

The graph and table in the attachment HERE show that while OHCS General Fund support is projected to dip below $10 Million:

• The total revenue loss for these three home ownership tax breaks is projected to exceed $2.2 Billion in the coming biennium. (If you do the math, you will see that these 3 tax breaks are projected to cost 232 times the cost of General Fund support for OHCS). 
• The projected increase in Oregon revenue lost in the coming biennium for these three tax breaks is $333 million (19%) AND
• Since the 2005-2007 biennium the cost of these 3 tax breaks has INCREASED by 55%, or $782 million.

Note that actual expenditure levels could be higher or lower than estimated; unlike housing programs that require an appropriation, there is NO CAP on the actual amount of spending for these home ownership tax breaks.

Editorial Comment: Because Oregon has NO meaningful state General funding of renter assistance programs, the Oregon state funding bias toward home ownership (over rental housing) IMHO clearly exceeds the significant bias at the federal level, where at least there are some direct appropriations for renter related programs like public housing, vouchers, project based vouchers, HOME and CDBG. 

Next week I hope to have a complete report on State of Oregon housing related tax breaks. 

Originally created and posted on the Oregon Housing Blog.