Renters in the Mortgage Crisis

The Post has had numerous articles about the housing crisis, but very few have dealt with how the mortgage mess has affected renters. When real estate prices were rising, they pushed up rental rates (not so long ago, my monthly rent went from $710 to $1,150, a 62 percent increase), but no one is suggesting that renters be rescued. Instead, renters can expect their taxes to be used to bail out mortgage lenders and homeowners, making it harder in the future for those same renters to be able to buy homes of their own.

If it is true that homeownership peaked in 2004 at 69 percent ["Home Values Are Down, and Not Just at the Bank," Outlook, July 20], that left 31 percent of the population as taxpayers who housed themselves by renting. But even if we renters don't own our homes, we still have to pay to live in them. Where is our bailout?

MARK TUNE

Alexandria

Federal policies strongly favor homeownership, as Alexander von Hoffman noted in "Home Values Are Down, and Not Just at the Bank," by allowing tax deductions for mortgage interest and property taxes. The larger the mortgage, the higher the deduction, a clear tilt toward higher-income borrowers. These tax breaks costs the Treasury more than $75 billion a year in revenue that would be collected by a neutral tax system.

In addition, homeownership is encouraged by Federal Housing Administration and Veterans Affairs insurance and guarantees for individual borrowers and implicitly for the investments of giant secondary-market enterprises -- Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

These policies are supported by powerful financial and real estate interests, but they are also consistent with bedrock beliefs in property ownership as an underpinning of the American way of life, and they are not likely to disappear.

What we need are responsible ownership and lending practices, unlike the callous methods of luring marginal families into low-down-payment teaser loans without documentation of ability to repay. Millions of families now losing their homes and credit ratings will need decent shelter somewhere.

Federal incentives should be offered to build and maintain an ample supply of affordable rental housing for families and individuals for whom ownership is too risky or is not inappropriate: young adults and migrants just entering the labor force and elderly and disabled people who cannot handle ownership functions. The sons and daughters of the Greatest Generation came mostly from renter families. There should be no stigma to living in rental housing.

MORTON J. SCHUSSHEIM

Washington