The Pew Charitable Trusts - State and Consumer Initiatives about Housing

Mortgage Deduction Rates Vary Widely Among States

The mortgage interest deduction is a tax break that benefits middle-class Americans all over the country—or does it?

The Geographic Distribution of the Mortgage Interest Deduction

The mortgage interest deduction is one of the largest tax expenditures in the U.S. tax code but the rate at which it is claimed and the average amount deducted vary widely across and within states. With changes to tax expenditures

States in Recovery: Housing

The housing crisis that threw states into economic free fall is helping them climb back out.

Strategies to Improve the Housing Market

Strategies to Improve the Housing Market is a summation of recommendations from experts representing the mortgage origination, servicing and insurance industries, investors, industry associations, federal agencies and regulators, and nonprofits.

Concerns Mount Over State Handling of Mortgage Funds

As states spend the $2.5 billion awarded to them as part of the mortgage crisis settlement agreed to earlier this year, there’s growing concern funds aren’t going where help’s needed most.

Activists Aim to Bolster Rhode Island’s Homeless Bill of Rights

After passing the nation’s first Homeless Bill of Rights this year, Rhode Island activists are looking to defend its provisions and expand their campaign to other parts of the country.

Losing Your Home to a Small Tax Debt?

When a little old lady is thrown out of her home two weeks before Christmas because she didn’t pay a $496 sewage bill, people take notice.

Strategies to Improve the Housing Market

Pew is working to identify practical solutions to address problems in the housing market. On June 20, 2012, Pew held a conference led by Senior Advisor Sheila Bair to evaluate potential policy options.

Revitalizing The Housing Market: Lessons from Canada

This paper compares the housing and mortgage finance systems in the United States and Canada and whether there are lessons that could be learned from the recent mortgage and housing crisis.

More States Consider Diverting Foreclosure Money

TODAY'S TAKE: Officials in a growing number of states are considering diverting money from a $25 billion foreclosure settlement between big banks and attorneys general to help pay for programs that have nothing to do with housing.

Deadline Arrives for Long-Awaited Foreclosure Settlement

TODAY'S TAKE: State attorneys general must decide by today (February 6) whether to join a settlement with five major banks they accuse of using illegal lending practices to cheat homeowners and speed foreclosures.

Lawsuit May Strain Foreclosure Talks

TODAY'S TAKE: Massachusetts has filed suit against five major banks over improper mortgage practices, potentially complicating a 50-state settlement that has been in the works for more than a year.

Housing Wealth and Higher Education

This August 2011 report, Housing Wealth and Higher Education: Building a Foundation for Economic Mobility, assessed how changes in housing wealth during the recent boom and bust affected students’ higher education decisions.

Does America Promote Mobility as Well as Other Nations?

This November 2011 fact sheet, Does America Promote Mobility As Well As Other Nations?, previewed selected key findings from a multi-country study of economic mobility.

Foreclosure Probe Explained: What State AGs Want From Big Banks

A year ago, all 50 states launched an investigation into some of the nation's biggest banks, accusing them of using illegal practices to cheat homeowners and worsen the foreclosure crisis. In this explainer, Stateline examines the states' investigation and its potential outcomes.

States Challenge Loss of Millions in Federal Housing Awards

SOCIAL POLICY BEAT: From Arizona to Rhode Island, more than a dozen states could lose millions of dollars a year in federal contracts to manage low-income housing programs. The move is supposed to save the federal government $100 million a year, but state jobs also are stake.

Florida Hopes Its Future Looks Like the Past

Florida is banking on an expected influx of retiring baby boomers to buy up the state's glut of empty housing and get an old formula for the state's fiscal health working again.

Budget Cuts Close California Governor's Mansion

TODAY'S TAKE: Of the $11 billion that California lawmakers have agreed to cut from the state budget this year, one line item stands out: The governor's mansion is one 70 state parks that will no longer be open to the public.

Maine Law Set Foreclosure Crisis in Motion

The court case that has exposed a national foreclosure problem came out of a state with one of the toughest foreclosure-control laws.

Summary of the Maryland State of the State Address

Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley (D) used his 2010 state of the state address Feb. 2 to push for job-creating policies, measures to help people stay in their homes and a general fund budget that spends less than the state did just four years ago.

Neighborhoods and the Black-White Mobility Gap

This 2009 report found that growing up in a high-poverty neighborhood increases the risk of experiencing downward mobility and explains a sizable portion of the black-white downward mobility gap.

States Cope With Rising Homelessness

As many as 3.4 million Americans are likely to experience homelessness this year - a 35 percent increase since the recession started in December 2007 - and a majority will be families with children. The economic stimulus package includes $1.5 billion to address the problem, but officials say it's not enough to cover the cost of housing for millions of families in crisis.

Opinion Poll on Economic Mobility and the American Dream

In early 2009, the project commissioned a national survey and series of focus groups to provide a more accurate picture of how Americans view their own economic mobility and to better understand how their perceptions square with the reality of

Tracking the Recession: States Boost Foreclosure Programs

The Obama administration has lots of company in its effort to slow home foreclosures. States have been coming up with solutions of their own.

Delegates Speak: On the Pocketbook

Aug. 28, 2008, 6:00 p.m. EDT Q. What serious issue in your state would you like the next president to address? Florida on the mortgage crisisI live in Florida, so where should I start? The mortgage crisis, the insurance crisis, the lack of confidence in FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency) being there to help people in an emergency … It just doesn't seem like McCain gets it, that these are real problems, that they affect real people. I guess if you have seven houses and one of the mortgages get foreclosed on, you just go to one of your other ones. I don't think (McCain) has thought through the mortgage crisis and the ramifications it has. If people are foreclosed, then neighborhoods go into decline. Just because I still have my job and my house is occupied and my neighbor loses his, suddenly the yard isn't cut and it becomes a haven for crime. It affects everybody and everything. It affects the schools in the area. I just don't think he gets that. -Florida delegate Lisa King, 45, of Jacksonville, interviewed by Pamela M. Prah, Stateline.org Pennsylvania on the economyWe come from a rural area mainly, in Adams County, Pennsylvania. We have farmlands etc. and working families struggling to pay for gas, food, clothing for their children and health care. Most people don't have health care in this region. We need to fix the economy and Barack Obama has promised us, and we have the faith that he will do this for us. -Pennsylvania delegate Patricia Manning, 66, Hamilton Township, interviewed by Pamela M. Prah, Stateline.org AFTER THE JUMP: Audio from the Stateline.org interviews with King and Manning Comments

States Act to Stem Foreclosure Scams

The rise of home foreclosures has spawned an increase in scams that prey on people's desperation to save their homes. At least 18 states have enacted laws to target such schemes.

States Unveil Mortgage Licensing System

States have a new tool to regulate mortgage companies and access their track records, including information on companies punished in other states for fraud or predatory lending.

States take lead to fix housing crisis

States are in the forefront of policymaking to minimize damage from the mortgage meltdown. Although President George W. Bush on Thursday (Dec. 6) announced a groundbreaking agreement with major lenders to temporarily freeze sub-prime interest rates that are set to rise, California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger got there first: He unveiled a similar deal last month.

Ohio Tries to Fend Off Foreclosures on Home Loans

Ohio, which leads the nation in highest foreclosure rates on home loans, is in the forefront of states' efforts to help homeowners whose once-affordable mortgage payments are now busting family bank accounts.

Voters Set to Judge Property Rights

Voters in 12 states - starting in Louisiana this weekend - will decide this election year whether to curb government's eminent domain powers, while those in four states will consider whether government should pay when one of its regulations lowers property values.

Arkansas Leads in Low-Income Assisted Living

Arkansas is one of the few states to lure assisted-living developers to its rural communities, using tax credits, streamlined rules and flexible Medicaid reimbursement rates. At about half the price of nursing homes, the more flexible elder-care facilities offer states a shield against a predicted explosion in long-term-care expenses created by aging baby boomers and skyrocketing health care costs.

Property Taxes Emerge as Election Issue

Soaring property tax bills, spurred by skyrocketing home prices, have gotten the attention of state lawmakers this election year. Pennsylvania's new property tax rebates for seniors stirred up some dust in the governor's race. Florida voters in November will consider a property tax discount for disabled war veterans and the elderly. In New York, property tax rebate checks could land in homeowners' mailboxes within weeks of the election.

Send Us Your Baby Boomers, States Plead

More states are trying to recruit retirees -- and the money they bring -- by promising an affordable paradise within their borders. Well-off baby boomers are being tempted with Web sites, guidebooks and tax breaks to relocate to live out their golden years. Hawaii beats last-place Texas in one ranking of wealth-friendly retirement spots.

In Their Own Words: Governors Name Greatest Challenges

Fixing the Medicaid mess is a top priority for America's governors, but job creation and affordable housing also emerged as concerns when Stateline.org recently questioned governors about the biggest challenges facing their states.

New Year Rings in Hundreds of New Statutes

The new year brings more than just a change of calendars. Hundreds of new state laws are taking effect from coast to coast, covering such diverse matters as the creation of a highway fast lane, determining who pays for birth control pills and dictating how you can split your tongue to resemble a snakes. And thats just in Illinois!

Hispanic-State Legislators to Convene in D.C.

Approximately 60 of the countrys 300 Hispanic state legislators will meet in Washington, D.C. this weekend to discuss education, health care, housing and economic development with members of Congress and business and academic communities.

States Ringing in New Laws

Besides football and hangovers, New Years Day will also bring many new state laws. These new additions to the statute books cover everything from fruit to taxes.

Virginia Agency Under Fire Over Home Loan Rules

In a move that has angered conservatives, the Virginia Housing Development Authority wants to give unrelated adults and nonmarried couples including homosexuals the opportunity to grasp the American dream: the dream of owning a home.

Housing Squeeze Tightens Around Low-Income Families

High housing costs are pinching low-income families in nearly every city and town in the United States, according to a report, released Wednesday by the National Low-Income Housing Coalition (NLIHC). "In no city, in no state is there a capacity for a person working on the minimum wage to be able to come close to affording a two-bedroom home," said Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts, at a Capitol Hill press conference.

Fighting Sprawl: A View From The Trenches

The growing pains of a small rural New England town offer a microcosm of the debate about sprawl. The writer of this report, a veteran newspaper and television newsman, provides a first-hand perspective of the complexity of managing growth amid competing interests even in tiny Durham, Maine.

Nevada Fastest-Growing State, Census Data Shows

Nevada is the fastest-growing state in the nation with a population increase of 3.8 percent last year, new Census Data shows. Overall, the population of western states grew by 1.5 percent, compared with a national average of less than one percent. The five largest states in the country now are California, Texas, New York, Florida and Illinois.

Policy Makers Walk Political Tightrope In Dealing With Sprawl

As state legislatures pause today, however briefly, to observe the twenty-ninth anniversary of Earth Day, government action on controlling growth and suburban sprawl has produced mixed results in the 1999 legislative sessions so far. In this report, stateline.org examines how policy makers in Utah, Colorado, Maryland, Virginia and South Carolina have dealt with the issue.