Last month The Papa and I refinanced our mortgage for the second time in 18 months, taking advantage of the lowest interest rates in years to shave a few dollars a month from our house payment. Well, okay, around $250 a month, although with the commensurate rise in our real estate taxes we're only enjoying about half that savings.

But NOW--we find out that what we really got when we THOUGHT we were just refinancing was a TAX CUT, courtesy of Barack Obama!

Obama said at his third press conference last month that the housing plan his administration has launched has "already contributed to a spike in the number of homeowners who are refinancing their mortgages, which is the equivalent of another tax cut." [emphasis mine]

Who knew??

Analysts, however, don't agree. The overall tax burden goes UP, even as interest costs go down, so any savings we get certainly can't be attributed to Mr. Obama's generosity or economic prowess:

Mark Steber, vice president of tax resources at Jackson Hewitt Tax Service said, "While generally there is no tax advantage to refinancing at a lower rate, an individual can save on the total out of pocket costs each year over the life of the loan.

"Though a tax bill will actually increase after refinancing, the increase in taxes may be less than half of the total difference in interest paid, so the taxpayer may save more money than their taxes increase, therefore resulting in net savings." [emphasis mine]

I guess we didn't reap the full advantage, though, as we could have:

Obama urged families to refinance at a photo-op in early April.

We missed the memo and didn't have a camera crew cover our signing.

(Misplaced modifier smile for you grammar junkies.)

Obama Equates Mortgage Refinancing With Tax Cut

(Oh, and for those of you in my area thinking about refinancing, please give Dan at Legacy Mutual a call and tell him we sent you. He is THE best.)

Labels: Money, ObamaNation, Theater of the Absurd