Sorry Readers: Homebuyer Credit Not Retroactive

Update: Just heard from White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki. The start date for the new $6,500 credit for existing homeowners will take effect as soon as Obama signs the bill into law tomorrow (Nov. 6). Sorry for the confusion. And thanks to “Dean” whose comment alerted me to my error. (In case you’re curious, this is the actual text of the bill. The credit extension was attached to a larger bill to extend unemployment benefits).

My last post was flooded with comments from readers asking whether the expanded credit will apply to them even though they closed on a home purchase earlier this year (or last year or the year before…). The answer: “No.”

It might seem unfair. But the new credit will take effect only after President Obama signs the measure into law tomorrow. Buyers will have until April 30 to sign purchase contracts and must close on the house by the end of June.

Under the new $10.8 billion plan, first-time buyers would continue to get $8,000 for buying a home. But existing homeowners will now be able to claim $6,500 credit for selling their current home and buying a new one, as long as they resided in the home they’re selling for at least five of the past eight years.

Income limits will also expand to $125,000 a year for individuals, and $225,000 a year for married couples. Sounds like a good deal right? Not judging from the flood of comments we’ve gotten from existing buyers who bought during the past several months. They feel gypped.

A commenter identifying himself as “Jim” said he bought a home during the Great Recession and was miffed that he didn’t get a tax credit because he wasn’t a first-time buyer. Now he’s angry.

“If they are handing out free money, give it to those who actually risked their capital,” he wrote a couple hours ago. “I am against this credit altogether … The government deciding who gets money and who doesn’t is TYRANNICAL.”

I sympathize with the comments. My parents only sold their Westchester County, N.Y. home of 30 years only a week ago and bought a much-less-expensive house one 15 miles away. They certainly would have qualified for the $6,500 credit and I’m afraid to break the news to them.

But the point of the credit is to stimulate home sales, not to hand out spending money (Though it will indeed stimulate some consumer spending). As I mentioned in my last post, it could be even less effective and efficient than the previous credit. If that’s the case, it’s best to put some limits on cost. Congressional analysts estimate that the six-month extension and expansion of the credit will cost taxpayers $10.8 billion. Can you imagine the price tag if it was made retroactive to the beginning of 2008?

View the original article here

Open Threads: Curbed Readers List the Buildings They Want Demolished

"The Crystal": Daniel Libeskind's addition to the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto

On Friday, Curbed asked readers: If you could demolish any one building, anywhere in the world, which building would it be and why? Here now, the Daniel Libeskind ritualistic sacrifice the responses:

2. Madison Square Garden, NYC

3. Steven Holl's Simmons Hall dormitory, Boston: "For sheer pretension and ugliness."

4. William Breger's Synagogue for the Arts, NYC: "an insult to that street, the neighborhood and the entire TriBeCa Zip code."

5. Rem Koolhaas' Seattle Library.

6. Richard Meier's Ara Pacis, Rome: "not a bad building but it is so out of place it should be knocked."

7. The New Museum, NYC: "A dumb idea made worse by lousy detailing and the arrogance of the forms. It makes me sick listening to self-professed aesthetes pretending to like something so obviously awful."

8. "Each and every Gene Kaufman turd in New York."

9. "Along with them, every other hideous, streetwall-breaking budget hotel (Courtyard, Best Western, etc.) built in the last 10 years, which all look the same in the same hideous way. Anything by Peter Poon or H. Robert O'Hara goes into this category."

10. Winka Dubbledam's supercilious and uber-pretentious glass-faced crap has done more to ruin the prevailing qualities of TriBeCa than a slew of wrecking balls could do in a month."

11. "gwathmeys kindergarden [sic] collage on Astor place tops the list, then that morphosis guys dumb thing every homeless guy uses as a dump below Astor. Poor Astor."

KING OF THE COMBOVER BONUS ROUND:

· "Anything and everything named 'TRUMP.'"
· "Every bright brass glitzy thing with Donalt [sic] Trump's name on it."
· "I agree that in most other cities, anything by Libeskind or Trump makes me want to puke."

LIBESKIND SUPER-SPECIAL DOUBLE BONUS ROUND:

· "The Crystal," Daniel Libeskind's addition to the Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto: "the world's worst addition in the history of construction." And: "an abomination by any standard."

· "I nominate the oversized and uber-ugly 'EL Masterpiece' lightfixture that Libeskind just designed for Zumtobel. It's bigger than some buildings ... though not as big as Libeskind's ego, of course. (BTW - What kind of pompous jerk calls his light fixture 'Masterpiece'?)"

· "Libeskind's ROM Crystal. His Las Vegas Crystal. Oh, what the hell, everything he's built, anywhere."

· "I think anything and everything by Daniel Libeskind would make the list. He can't seem to tell the difference between his own turds and real design."

· "It's not a building, but I nominate Libeskind's Tre Piu Door just because he's so ridiculous and the jerk deserves it." (YouTube video here.)

· "Get rid of Libeskind's office and most of the hideous building problem goes away with it."

· Libeskind's Zlota 44 tower, Poland: "makes the communist era buildings look good."

· Libeskind's Museum Residences, Denver: "Sorry, but if the topic is 'eye-searingly awful buildings,' then Libeskind's name is going to figure prominently."

· Libeskind's Jewish Contemporary Museum, San Francisco: "where he mutilated an historic building with another of his stupid crystal forms. He's really degraded architecture across the globe."

Got any additions? Leave 'em in the comments!

· If You Could Demolish Any One Building, Which Would it Be? [Curbed National]

View the original article here

Calling All Nominations: Dearest readers, please get your nominations...

× Like us and you'll find top breaking news in your Facebook newsfeed. Sign up for our daily email newsletter and get top stories and breaking news delivered to your inbox. Thursday, April 7, 2011, by Abby Pontzer

Dearest readers, please get your nominations in for your Most Hated Piece of Public Art in SF. We'll be compiling the responses and taking a poll next week to see which piece of crap will receive the highest honors. There's certainly more out there than some dirty rope and a couple of fugly fountains, right? Leave your esteemed nomination here.

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Sorry Readers: Homebuyer Credit Not Retroactive

Update: Just heard from White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki. The start date for the new $6,500 credit for existing homeowners will take effect as soon as Obama signs the bill into law tomorrow (Nov. 6). Sorry for the confusion. And thanks to “Dean” whose comment alerted me to my error. (In case you’re curious, this is the actual text of the bill. The credit extension was attached to a larger bill to extend unemployment benefits).

My last post was flooded with comments from readers asking whether the expanded credit will apply to them even though they closed on a home purchase earlier this year (or last year or the year before…). The answer: “No.”

It might seem unfair. But the new credit will take effect only after President Obama signs the measure into law tomorrow. Buyers will have until April 30 to sign purchase contracts and must close on the house by the end of June.

Under the new $10.8 billion plan, first-time buyers would continue to get $8,000 for buying a home. But existing homeowners will now be able to claim $6,500 credit for selling their current home and buying a new one, as long as they resided in the home they’re selling for at least five of the past eight years.

Income limits will also expand to $125,000 a year for individuals, and $225,000 a year for married couples. Sounds like a good deal right? Not judging from the flood of comments we’ve gotten from existing buyers who bought during the past several months. They feel gypped.

A commenter identifying himself as “Jim” said he bought a home during the Great Recession and was miffed that he didn’t get a tax credit because he wasn’t a first-time buyer. Now he’s angry.

“If they are handing out free money, give it to those who actually risked their capital,” he wrote a couple hours ago. “I am against this credit altogether … The government deciding who gets money and who doesn’t is TYRANNICAL.”

I sympathize with the comments. My parents only sold their Westchester County, N.Y. home of 30 years only a week ago and bought a much-less-expensive house one 15 miles away. They certainly would have qualified for the $6,500 credit and I’m afraid to break the news to them.

But the point of the credit is to stimulate home sales, not to hand out spending money (Though it will indeed stimulate some consumer spending). As I mentioned in my last post, it could be even less effective and efficient than the previous credit. If that’s the case, it’s best to put some limits on cost. Congressional analysts estimate that the six-month extension and expansion of the credit will cost taxpayers $10.8 billion. Can you imagine the price tag if it was made retroactive to the beginning of 2008?

View the original article here