The rising cost of homeownership has made housing policy a central component of Vice President Kamala Harriss platform. Among her proposals is to provide $25,000 in down payment assistance for first-time homebuyers who have paid their rent on time for two years.
Although the proposal might sound enticing to new homebuyers, its unintended consequences will be most harmful to its intended beneficiaries.
Details are sketchy, but one possibility is for the assistance to come in the form of a federal loan, not unlike the student loans issued by the Department of Education. Although some of these loans are interest-free, most are not. When student borrowers make payments on their loans, the revenue is used to issue new student loans, making the policy ostensibly self-financing.
Federal tuition assistance, therefore, offers some warnings about Harriss downpayment-assistance plan.