Well the good news is thanks to Jug-Ears the value of your home isn’t likely to climb in the near future. If anything, it’ll be the opposite, so maybe you won’t get hit by the death tax.
They didn't have a "significant" majority in the house, and they didn't even have a functional majority in the senate when you consider the RINO sisters from Maine, along with McCain and Ailing Sphincter. They took what they could get, and counted on being able to pressure the dems to extend the tax cuts. They tried to make them permanent, but even when they still had a majority the dems were able to block every attempt to make them permanent.