SALT cap hurting Lower Hudson Valley housing market

The new tax bill that puts a cap of $10,000 on the federal deduction for state and local taxes is hurting the housing market in the Lower Hudson Valley, LoHud reported. The area saw a “slight decrease in activity and sales for the first time in quite a while” and a “larger level of decrease in the very high-end market” in the second quarter of 2019, Ron Garafalo, president of the Hudson Gateway Association of Realtors, told the outlet. Single-family home sales in Westchester County fell by 3.9 percent year-over-year, to 1,500. As a matter of comparison, sales stood at 1,643 during the second quarter of 2016, which was the best second quarter in recent years, per LoHud. Rockland County, meanwhile, had 459 single-family home sales during the last three months — a 2.3 percent decline from the same time period last year. Joseph Rand, chief creative officer and managing partner with Better Homes and Gardens Rand Realty, told the outlet he was “convinced that the [state and local tax] cap really had a much bigger impact on this housing market than I expected.” [LoHud]