Persons interested in buying a home will catch a break in the form of an $8,000 tax credit that does not have to be repaid, said Ron Lee, vice president of the Washington/St. Tammany Home Builders Association.

The definition of a new homeowner in this case is that you have not owned a home in the past 36 months. In addition, the tax credit will have a cap of 10 percent of the value of the home, but it is applicable to any home, whether newly built or a fixer-upper in need of TLC.

Title to the house must be taken before Dec. 1, 2009, and the tax credit will appear on your tax return for this year. Lee said if for some reason a person does not owe $8,000 in taxes, the difference will be refunded to the new homeowner, a nice incentive for buying now. Louisiana mortgage companies did not invest in the sub-prime economic market, said Lee. As a result, Louisiana is not seeing the astronomical foreclosure rates seen in other states. He said in some areas of the country, houses are almost being given away.

If buying a house for the first time, or upgrading or downsizing, he said it’s a good idea to check with a mortgage company to see what you are qualified to buy. Many people assume that since qualifications have gotten stricter throughout the country, they will not be able to buy very much.

Instead, Lee said many people are pleasantly surprised to find how much house they can afford. This is because financing qualifications in the area have always been conservative, and lenders have not had to reset standards as much as in the rest of the country.

The amount of a loan available will greatly depend on the person’s credit. With an excellent or superior credit rating, it is still possible to get 90-95 percent financing, Lee said.