Senator Reid to Ask Congress to Extend Homebuyers' Tax Credit

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said on Thursday that he would back a measure to extend the deadline from June 30 to Sept. 30 for first-time homebuyers to close their deals in order to receive the federal $8,000 tax credit.

Thousands of homebuyers who met the requirement of signing purchase contracts by April 30 are in danger of missing the deadline to close their deals, thus making them ineligible for the tax break. The popular program led to a flood of home buyers trying to get in under the April deadline, leading to bottlenecks and delays in closing the transactions.

"Everybody who got under contract at the end of April deserves to get the tax credit," Stephen Adamo, president of Weichert Financial Services, a division of real-estate brokerage Weichert Realtors, told The Wall Street Journal. "For reasons out of their control, they're in jeopardy of losing it."

Last fall, Congress extended the tax credit program to April 2010 and added a smaller $6,500 credit for current homeowners who were buying a primary residence. The National Association of Realtors, which is lobbying Congress to extend the measure only for those who met the April contract deadline, says 55,000 to 75,000 homeowners may be in jeopardy of losing the tax credit.