UPDATE: Beneficial Ownership Reporting Requirements Reinstated; New Deadline Jan. 13
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit yesterday stayed a previous order temporarily halting implementation of the Corporate Transparency Act (CTA) and its beneficial ownership reporting obligations for certain corporations and limited liability companies. As a result, reporting companies now must comply with the new requirements.
FinCEN, the enforcement agency for the rules, issued an alert extending the deadline to Jan. 13 from Jan. 1 in light of yesterday’s decision.
As reported in a recent NAHBNow blog post, on Dec. 3, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas issued a nationwide preliminary injunction temporary halting implementation of the CTA and its beneficial ownership reporting obligations. The district court’s decision effectively relieved reporting companies of their obligation to comply with the CTA’s Jan. 1, 2025, reporting deadline.
In a down-to-the-wire effort to preserve the Jan. 1 deadline, the Department of Justice (DOJ), on behalf of the Treasury Department and other federal defendants, immediately filed a notice of appeal with the Fifth Circuit. A few days later, DOJ followed up with an emergency motion seeking a stay of the district court’s injunction pending appeal.
The fifth circuit yesterday determined that the "government has demonstrated that a stay is warranted" and temporarily blocked enforcement of the lower district court's order and injunction pending appeal. The decision cited Congress's broad Commerce Clause authority to regulate entities engaged in commercial activities, the infliction of irreparable harm to the government, and a balance of equities favoring the public's urgent interest in combating financial crimes and national security versus the minimal reporting burden placed on reporting companies.
Although the Fifth Circuit order did not delay any reporting deadlines, FinCEN has since released an alert on the matter with reporting deadline extensions, including the new Jan. 13 date.
Latest from NAHBNow
Housing Affordability
Oct 21, 2025
The Fight for Housing Affordability: NAHB Spotlights Key HurdlesNAHB CEO Jim Tobin recently appeared on the Builder Straight Talk podcast to highlight the housing affordability hurdles builders face in the current market, and how the Federation is working at the local, state and national levels to address them.
Sponsored Content
Oct 21, 2025
Why Builders Overpay for Land and How to Protect Your MarginsLand is the single largest cost driver in any home building project. But even experienced acquisition teams sometimes overpay. This is often the result of a lack of context and outdated data.
Latest Economic News
Economics
Oct 20, 2025
Non-Conventional Financing for New Home Sales Loses Ground in 2024Nationwide, the share of non-conventional financing for new home sales accounted for 31% of the market per NAHB analysis of the 2024 Census Bureau Survey of Construction (SOC) data. This is 1.7 percentage point lower than the 2023 share of 32.4%. As in previous years, conventional financing dominated the market at 69.3% of sales, higher than the 2023 share of 67.6%.
Economics
Oct 17, 2025
Better Growth, Larger Deficits: CBO Fiscal OutlookThe Congressional Budget Office (CBO) is a key nonpartisan score keeper that measures the effects of policy changes by the Federal Government. With several policy changes since January of this year, including the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA), stricter immigration, and higher tariffs, the CBO updated its economic projections through 2028.
Economics
Oct 16, 2025
Amid Market Challenges, Builder Expectations Rise in OctoberEven as builders continue to grapple with market and macroeconomic uncertainty, sentiment levels posted a solid gain in October as future sales expectations surpassed the 50-point breakeven mark for the first time since last January.