Mortgage-Tax Break Curbed by Housing Slump

Bloomberg reports:

The cost of one of the country’s most expensive individual tax breaks is shrinking as the number of Americans who own homes declines and mortgage rates hover near historic lows.

Federal tax filers claimed almost $71 billion less in mortgage interest deductions for 2009 than for 2007, a 14 percent drop, according to the Internal Revenue Service. That trend continued in 2010, the IRS said in a report last month, as preliminary data showed that lower interest rates, home ownership and home prices curbed use of the tax deduction by 7.2 percent.