Owning your home can reduce your tax liabilities: both the mortgage interest and real estate taxes are deductible from your income tax.
The deductible mortgage interest is up to $1 million or half that if filing separately, if you used the money to build, buy or improve your home and the home is the collateral for the loan.
Points or origination fees paid by you or the seller are wholly deductible.
One point is 1% of the loan taken to buy the home.
Or you can also amortize the points, which option usually resorted to when the standard deduction is more than the itemized deductions.
If you refinance your home mortgage, the points gained should be amortized over the term of the new loan The interest on loans secured by the home, which proceeds were used other than to build, buy or improve the home, is also deductible up to $100,000, although the limit may be lower depending on the value of the home.
But if the local government or state issues you a mortgage certificate credit, the credit you might claim should be deducted from the interest amount you paid.
Should you sell your home, the gain may be excluded from the taxable income up to $250,000 (double in joint filing).
The exclusion can be claimed if you lived there for at least 2 years in the 5 years prior to the sale.
The exclusion can be claimed only once in that 2-year period.
You may still claim a reduced exclusion if you sold your home because of unanticipated cause like change of place of employment or divorce.
A loss on the sale is not deductible.