The Treasury Department has learned that roughly 1,300 prison inmates wrongly received more than $9 million in tax credits for homebuyers as part of the Administration’s stimulus effort. These unique homebuyers included 241 inmates serving life sentences.
They are part of the over 14,000 taxpayers who wrongly walked away with almost $30 million in tax credits intended to boost the housing markets, In one case, 67 taxpayers used the same home to claim the credits.
President Obama and Congress upgraded the credit significantly to $8,000 and got rid of the requirement that it be repaid. It appears that came as a relief to the aspiring home owners in cellblocks across the country. After all, many of these cells are the ultimate fixer-uppers.
Source: NBC.
The IRS is totally FUBAR.
3 days ago I got the $300 2009 Obama stimulus check I was supposed to have gotten last year, along with two separate identical letters from the IRS telling me I would be getting the $300 check. In the same mail delivery I also got another IRS letter telling me I hadn’t received the Bush $600 2008 stimulus check [a fact which I already knew], informing me that to get the $600 I had to amend my 2008 return. Huh?
You’d think in this day and age, the IRS would be able to design some sort of computer program to catch 67 people claiming tax credits for the same house. All you would need is the real estate tax id number for the property in the tax return.
As far as the prisoners go, apparently the IRS doesn’t have the SS numbers of prisoners, partly because the prison authorities of some states don’t want to give the IRS this information.
LOL, and we thought inmate mail was reviewed.