Jon Fleischman

Everyone blames high interest rates for the frozen housing market. But there's another massive problem that almost nobody talks about: A federal tax policy that hasn't been updated in nearly 30 years. In 1997, Congress established a $500,000 capital gains tax exclusion for married couples selling their primary residence. Nearly three decades later? Still $500,000. Adjusted for inflation, that exclusion should be approximately $1.05 MILLION today. Here's why that matters: Imagine a California (or other hot markets) couple who bought their middle-class home in 2000 for $500,000. Today, that home is easily worth $1.5 million. They've built $1 million in equity appreciation. But if they sell, only $500,000 of that gain is exempt from federal capital gains taxes. The other $500,000? That will be subject to federal AND California taxes. Depending on their circumstances, for most that'll mean a six-figure tax bill. So think about the decision facing that couple: • Give up their 3% mortgage. • Pay today's much higher interest rates. • Hand the government $100k-$150k just for selling their home. Why would they move? They don't downsize. They don't upsize. They stay put. And another home that could have been on the market never gets listed. Multiply that decision by hundreds of thousands of homeowners and you begin to understand why housing inventory remains so constrained. There's a bipartisan bill in Congress, the More Homes on the Market Act (H.R. 1340), that would increase the exclusion to $1 million for married couples and finally index it to inflation. I haven't read the entire bill but the structure is a commonsense reform that could help unlock existing housing inventory and remove a major barrier in moving. We talk endlessly about building more homes and they are needed. But we should also stop penalizing people for selling the homes they already have.