mortgage talk: Jordan vs. Liu, and much more.

Henry C.K. Liu hliu at mindspring.com
Thu May 27 14:10:01 PDT 1999


Not only that; the income from alternative investment is subject to income tax, so it becomes a wash with mortgage interest deduction for tax purposes. And if the income from alternative investment is higher than the mortgage payments due to the assumption of a higher risk exposure, the extra income is also taxed at 35%, meaning that the investor is taking 35% extra risk for the government. With income producing assets, unlike a home, there is the additional tax benefit of depreciation. So again, hocking one's home in order to participate in speculation ranks near using alcohol to boost confidence.

Henry C.K. Liu

Enrique Diaz-Alvarez wrote:


> Greg Nowell wrote:
> >
> >(interest paid on
> > the mortgage is deductible from income taxes in the
> > U.S., which means that your real interest cost is
> > determined by your marginal tax rate, which in most
> > middle class cases will be about 35% state 'n' federal)
>
> Yes, but in order to get the deduction you have to give up the standard
> deduction, which for a married couple is around $7,500, right? So you
> are only getting 35% on any interest above and beyond $7,500. If you
> have a mortgage under $100,000 (which is above the average morgage,
> actually), you get no benefit from this tax scam, which is directed
> exclusively towards the upper middle classes and the rich. In an
> innumerate country, you can pass it off as
>
> How many mortgage-related calculations actually take this little detail
> into account?
>
> --
> Enrique Diaz-Alvarez Office # (607) 255 5034
> Electrical Engineering Home # (607) 272 4808
> 112 Phillips Hall Fax # (607) 255 4565
> Cornell University mailto:enrique at ee.cornell.edu
> Ithaca, NY 14853 http://peta.ee.cornell.edu/~enrique



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