I would hope that someone was a self-reliant citizen first. This only reinforces dependency on government. The response will be "the government got me my home."
I live in a middle-class townhouse development of which most of the owners are recent immigrants. I applaud all of them that have worked hard and saved to be able to make their first home purchase (although I wish that some had left the third world back in the third world). How are they able to do it while other minorities have not? Perhaps different ethics - work hard and save?
I would be more accepting of some type of tax break for all Americans to help them save up for a down payment. It took us every nickel we had to get ours together and making the payments with the PMI is not easy, but we are doing it.
What this does is simply put one group against another. If I choose not to live in a "low-income area" I can't qualify. Of course, being a white male would probably disqulaify me outright. So my money is being extracted to give to someone else so they can simply ask for the down payment money while we scrimped and saved to get ours.
Also, what about minorities that want to get a house so they can escape the high crime and degradation of the inner cities? I was recently in Charlotte looking at houses. We were not completely familiar with all of the surrounding areas so we drove to several locations that had home listings priced where we could afford them. The first place we went was beautiful. Every home was immaculate (at least the outsides). They must have put untold hours into maintaining their yards. Then we noticed that all of the owners were black. These people worked hard and saved so that they could escape the problems of the ghetto and none of them would have gotten any help from this program.
I see this as nothing but another feel-good, doomed to failure, handout program. Kemp tried some similar deal with his "enterprise zones" that failed miserably. The only way to make a difference along these lines is to alter the mindset of people that aren't doing the right thing.
I am furious at this administration. He has one good appointee - Rumsfeld. The rest only qualify as better than what we had under Clinton (or only marginally less of an embarrasment). To me, that is just not good enough. He is using the same tactics Clinton did. Just go along with the other party to steal their thunder. Given a choice it might be better to have a Democrat that goes along with the Republican initiatives rather that a Republican that goes along with all of the Democrat initiatives.
I had to hold my nose to vote for Bush in 2000. Will I be able to hold my nose again in 2004. The way things are going, it is going to be much more difficult.
Government subsidies create a disincentive to be responsible.