Pub. 17, Chapter 16 - Selling Your Home
If you financed your home under a federally subsidized program
(loans from tax-exempt qualified mortgage bonds or loans with mortgage
credit certificates), you may have to recapture all or part of the
benefit you received from that program when you sell or otherwise
dispose of your home. You recapture the benefit by increasing your
federal income tax for the year of the sale. The exclusion of gain
provisions discussed earlier in this chapter do not apply to this
recapture tax.
The recapture tax is figured on
Form 8828.
If you sell your
home and your mortgage loan is subject to the recapture rules, you
must file Form 8828 even if you do not owe a recapture tax.
Loans subject to recapture rules.
The recapture of the subsidy applies to loans provided after 1990
that:
- Came from the proceeds of qualified mortgage bonds issued
after August 15, 1986, or
- Were based on mortgage credit certificates issued after
1990.
The recapture also applies to assumptions of these loans.
If your mortgage loan is subject to this recapture rule, you should
have received a notice containing information that you need to figure
the recapture tax.
When the recapture applies.
The recapture of the federal mortgage subsidy applies only if you
meet both of the following conditions.
- You sell or otherwise dispose of your home:
- At a gain, and
- During the first 9 years after the date you closed your
mortgage loan.
- Your income for the year of disposition is more than that
year's adjusted qualifying income for your family size for that year
(related to the income requirements a person must meet to qualify for
the federally subsidized program).
When recapture does not apply.
The recapture does not apply if any of the following
situations apply to you:
- Your mortgage loan was a qualified home improvement loan of
not more than $15,000,
- The home is disposed of as a result of your death,
- You dispose of the home more than 9 years after the date you
closed your mortgage loan,
- You transfer the home to your spouse, or to your former
spouse incident to a divorce, where no gain is included in your
income,
- You dispose of the home at a loss,
- Your home is destroyed by a casualty, and you repair it or
replace it on its original site within 2 years after the end of the
tax year when the destruction happened, or
- You refinance your mortgage loan (unless you later meet all
of the conditions listed previously under When the recapture
applies).
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