President Barack Obama is pushing Congress to rework an existing tax deduction for landlords who retrofit their commercial properties to create better incentives for promoting energy efficiency, NBC News reported. The plan, revealed today during a speech at Pennsylvania State University, is part of Obama’s post-State of the Union address tour, piggybacking on his call during the Jan. 25 speech to reduce the nation’s dependence on oil. Today, Obama set a goal of reducing energy use in U.S. commercial properties by 20 percent by the year 2020. [more]

The Obama administration’s $75 billion foreclosure prevention program has been widely criticized for its failure to, well, prevent very many foreclosures, and ProPublica has been investigating why the program has come up short. According to the publication, one major factor has been a possible “fatal” lack of oversight by the Treasury Department, which said this week that it doesn’t have the power under the Home Affordable Mortgage Program, known as HAMP, to punish mortgage servicers for denying loan modifications without cause. [more]

Record-low mortgage interest rates helped to further stabilize the housing market over the past month, according to the latest “Housing Scorecard” released by the Obama Administration yesterday. While new and existing home sales stuck at lower levels than those seen prior to the expiration of the homebuyer tax credit, prices have stopped slipping after 33 consecutive months of declines, the report says, and in the second quarter of 2010, U.S. homeowners gained $95 billion worth of home equity. TRD [more]

President Barack Obama’s former Columbia University crash pad is off the market after a young couple signed a one-year, $1,900-per-month lease. The one-bedroom apartment, a third-floor walk-up at 42 West 109th Street that Obama shared with a roommate during his junior year at Columbia, has a windowless home office and exposed brick walls. The unit was only on the market for two weeks, said Citi Habitats listing broker Dalila Bella, who told Crain’s that curiosity about the president’s former digs spurred a flurry of interest. [Crain's]

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It’s official: the homebuyer tax credit closing deadline has been extended. President Obama signed into law today HR 5623, which gives homebuyers who were under contract by April 30 until Sept. 30 to close their purchases and claim their federal tax credit. The bill passed in the House Tuesday and in the Senate Wednesday. The original closing deadline was June 30. [Inman News]

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President Obama’s mortgage modification plan took a hit yesterday, after Treasury Department data revealed at the rate of default on mortgages among homeowners in the program almost doubled in March, according to the New York Times. The defaults came even after homeowners enrolled in the program had received less expensive mortgage terms, as more than 2,800 borrowers holding the modified loans were unable to make payments since the program began last fall. Currently around 7 million households are delinquent in their mortgage payments.

Could Congress’ ambitious second round of home purchase tax credits — especially the $6,500 repeat buyer credit — turn out to be a wimp in terms of economic stimulus clout?
With the April 30 deadline to sign home purchase contracts for both the $8,000 first-time buyer credit and the $6,500 version looming, some real estate and building experts are concerned that fewer consumers may be motivated by the credits this spring than last fall.
The $6,500 credit, in particular, appears to be generating relatively little buzz among shoppers. As Gloria Ruesch, a broker with N.P. Dodge Real Estate in Omaha, Neb., put it, “I don’t think most people have any idea about it, or just don’t understand it. No one’s talking about it.” [more]

With President Obama’s latest foreclosure prevention program recently unveiled, some may be wondering which homeowners will be able to take advantage of the $14 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program initiative. According to “Today” show personal finance correspondent Sharon Epperson, the program targets two kinds of at-risk borrowers: those who are unemployed and those who are underwater. And while the program won’t help the unemployed on the job line, jobless borrowers will be able to have their payments reduced for as long as six months, something that could help them out in the short-term, Epperson said.

Just 10 percent of real estate agents think Obama’s Home Affordable Mortgage Program has actually slowed the rate of foreclosures, according to a survey released yesterday by national real estate listings site Homes & Land. Sixty-five percent of agents believed that the HAMP initiative had definitely not helped, while the rest were unsure. The survey, conducted in February, culled responses from almost 5,800 agents in local markets across the country. More than half of respondents had been working as real estate agents for more than 10 years. Despite the perceived HAMP failure, most agents were optimistic about market conditions: 58 percent said consumer interest in purchasing a home had increased over the past three months. TRD

Today is the one-year anniversary of the Obama administration’s announcement of its Home Affordable Mortgage Program, and it comes with good news. The program, which aims to keep borrowers in their homes by modifying their mortgage payments, has crossed the 1 million mark in trial modifications granted and has seen permanent loan modifications double in January to over 116,000 from just over 66,000 in December, CNBC’s Diana Olick reported. However, critics say the improvements are too meager to make much of a difference, with 5.6 million borrowers delinquent on their mortgages and only two-thirds of HAMP participants current on their modified payments. Meanwhile, just 12 percent of participants have seen a permanent reduction in their mortgage payments since the program began. Roughly 51,000 trial modifications have been cancelled as a result of non-payment or lack of documentation, Olick said.