Leading one of the largest coalitions of housing advocates ever assembled in the United States, NAHB (National Association of Home Builders) is pushing for a housing stimulus plan that will stabilize the marketplace and address the ongoing crisis in the financial markets that is constraining the flow of credit the nation needs to halt a deepening recession.   

"In 1975, Congress passed a short-term $2,000 tax credit for all new homes ($12,000 adjusted for today's median home prices) coupled with subsidized mortgage rates," according to the coalition. "The stimulus jump started the depressed economy and the effects continued long after the measure expired." 

"Entering this holiday season, we saw a sobering loss of more than half a million jobs in November, and major job cutbacks among the nation's top employers are being announced daily," said NAHB President and Chief Executive Officer Jerry Howard. Three million home building-related jobs have been lost as a result of the slowdown in housing production, which represents $145 billion in lost wages and $4.9 billion in lost purchases. Deterioration in these jobs has now spilled over into virtually all sectors of the U.S. job market.   

“Thousands (soon to be millions) of jobs across all industries have been lost as a result of the housing crisis,” the coalition says. “Consumers have stopped purchasing, and small businesses are failing. Time is of the essence — single-day market changes can quickly wipe out the $700 billion economic recovery plan.”

The coalition predicts that the housing stimulus would stop the fall in home values and encourage prospective homebuyers who have been sitting on the fence to return to the market, giving a boost to home sales and soon energizing the economy and creating new job opportunities. 

"We are leaving no stone unturned in conveying to our government and the public the message that a housing stimulus is urgently needed, and that restoring demand for housing is the fastest, most effective way of reviving the economy.  We need to put a stop to this dangerous erosion on Main Street before it grows out of control. Fixing housing is the obvious starting point for putting the country back to work, and restoring confidence in the strength of our economy,” Howard said.