My Comments: As someone who has a home mortgage, I’ve long enjoyed the abilty to write off the interest I pay against my taxable income. If these folks are right, I’ll be eligible for a tax credit instead of an expense item and I may very well enjoy a higher benefit.

But if you think the real estate industry is going to roll over and play dead, think again. I’m inclined to think their argumet in favor of no change is a spurious one, but I’m a lonely voice. It’s similar to the arguments in favor of a flat tax; the number of accountants and tax folks who depend on a complicated tax code to sustain their standard of living is huge. They are not going to roll over and play dead either.

By Mark Koba | CNBC – Tue, Jul 9, 2013

Congressional action on the U.S. tax code could dramatically alter one of its sacred cows: the mortgage interest deduction. And the change could come in 2013.

House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dave Camp (R-Mich) held tax reform hearings in April to eliminate loopholes. He said he’s “carefully looking into revising” the popular provision that many in the real estate business consider crucial to the industry.

Camp said he’d like a total tax reform package before the year is out.

One analyst says the time is ripe to change the deduction-in existence since 1913- which is costing the U.S. government billions in tax revenue while doing little to help home ownership.

“It costs at least $70 billion a year in lost tax revenues,” said Will Fischer, a senior policy analyst at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, and co-author of a study released last month that called for changing the mortgage interest deduction intto a tax credit.

“It only benefits about half of homeowners that pay interest,” Fischer said. “I think there’s real interest in reforming the mortgage interest deduction to help more people, while bringing in more tax revenue.”

Right now, taxpayers who itemize their deductions can deduct up to $1 million of the interest paid on their mortgages, plus up to $100,000 of the interest on home equity loans, a type of loan in which borrowers use the equity in their home as collateral. Homeowners can do the same on a second home.

In his paper, Fisher states that in 2012, 77 percent of the benefits from the mortgage interest deduction went to homeowners with incomes above $100,000. Close to half of homeowners with mortgages-mostly lower and middle-income families-received no benefit from the deduction, according to Fisher.

Only about 30 percent of eligible taxpayers actually use the mortgage interest deduction each year.

“You can make the case for the deduction, but it really does promote home ownership for mostly upper income levels,” said Mark Goldman, a real estate professor at San Diego State University.

“And I’ve never had a deal happen or not happen because of the deduction,” added Goldman, who is also a real estate broker.

Fischer’s study points to several bipartisan panels that have looked into changing the deduction into a tax credit.

They include the Simpson-Bowles fiscal commission, as well as a tax reform group during the first term of president George W. Bush, and a debt reduction commission headed by former Democratic White House official Alice Rivlin and former New Mexico Republican Senator Pete Domenici.