Wealth building and household financial stability are primary benefits of homeownership that complement quality of life factors associated with stable housing. It’s no secret that Black households have a significantly lower rate of homeownership and, as a result, have not had the opportunity to develop and leverage the generational economic benefits of owning a home. The contributing factors and resulting impacts are innumerable and unjust. While understanding and unraveling the history of policies and biases that have created this division is important, our focus here is on the future.
With a new era of politics and leadership, there is renewed opportunity to enact policies that create transformative change for our communities and for residents who have been too long locked out of the chance for elevation.
Can generations of inequality be corrected by the implementation of a single policy? No. Can we uplift individual households and distressed communities by directing investment into the development of real, appreciating assets that build equity for their owners? Yes. The good news is that it’s being done. The bad news is that it’s not being done enough.
Tax credit policies to increase homeownership opportunity do exist. They have been used across the nation to expand the supply of affordable for-sale homes, presenting residents with an accessible opportunity to buy rather than rent – to build equity for themselves rather than for a landlord. Explore this site or contact us to learn more about the use of existing federal tax credits and the prospect for federal and state tax credits to expand the inventory of affordable for-sale homes. Click below to access recent research by the Urban Institute that details trends on homeownership rates and the policies that could be enacted to address homeownership disparity.
