Congress doubles home-sale tax break for wealthy sellers, calls it housing relief
H.R. 1340 — More Homes on the Market Act · Filed by Jimmy Panetta (D-CA) · 156 cosponsors · Introduced Feb 13, 2025 · Referred to committee
Your members of Congress
Enter a ZIP to see where your representative and both senators stood on this bill.
Looked up on this device — your ZIP is never stored on our servers.
What it does
This bill doubles the federal tax exclusion for gains on the sale of a primary home from $250,000 to $500,000 for single filers and from $500,000 to $1,000,000 for married couples filing jointly. It also indexes these amounts to inflation annually starting in 2025. The effect: homeowners can sell their primary residence and exclude twice as much profit from federal income tax, reducing their tax liability on the sale.
Why we flagged it
The bill is a straightforward tax-code amendment that reduces federal tax liability on home-sale gains for a specific taxpayer class. It is not a housing-supply or affordability measure despite the title's framing.
What the text implies
- Title 'More Homes on the Market Act' implies a housing-supply or affordability goal, but the mechanism is a tax cut for sellers, not a policy to increase housing stock or lower purchase prices for buyers.
- Benefit is regressive: homeowners with large capital gains (typically higher-income households) capture the full tax savings; renters and first-time buyers receive no benefit despite being the groups most constrained by housing costs.
The full analysis lists 4 implications of this text.
Who stands to gain
homeowners with substantial home equity and capital gains; higher-income households (primary beneficiaries of tax exclusion increases)