Free Republic

In 2016, 20.9 percent of black borrowers and 15.5 percent of Hispanic borrowers were turned down for a conventional loan; at the same time, just 8.1 percent of white and 10.4 percent of Asian applicants were denied a conventional loan. Blacks in the mid-1990s were roughly twice as likely to be denied as whites. In 2016, blacks were 2.6 times as likely to be denied a conventional mortgage as whites. Borrowers in suburban areas had the best chances of being approved for a mortgage – 8.4 percent of all suburban homebuyers were denied for a conventional loan in 2016, while...

NEW YORK - Bad credit has supplanted terrorism as the gravest immediate risk threatening the economy, a key national research group reported Monday. Borrowers' withering ability to pay their bills and the subsequent fallout in the credit markets this summer topped the list of short-term risks on peoples' minds, according to a survey of 258 members conducted by the National Association of Business Economics. NABE, a Washington-based association, said 32 percent of its surveyed members cited loan defaults and excessive debt as their biggest near-term concern. Only 20 percent of members cited defense and terrorism as their biggest immediate worry,...

Blacks have been charged higher auto loan rates than other auto buyers, federal research says. But the gap in loan rates could narrow, and possibly disappear, as the result of recently concluded lawsuits. Blacks paid a typical auto loan rate of 7 percent for new cars, compared with 5 percent for whites in 2004, according to a consumer organization's analysis of the Federal Reserve Survey of Consumer Finances. That was the most recent survey available. And blacks were more likely than auto buyers in general to have auto loan rates higher than 15 percent. For used car loans, 27 percent...