Posted on 10/19/2019 4:22:22 PM PDT by karpov
When tens of thousands of African-Americans held the keys to their first homes in the early 1970s as part of a new federal program that encouraged black homeownership, they thought they were about to fulfill the American dream. Instead they got an American nightmare.
The story begins with the urban uprisings of the late 1960s, which were reactions to decades of poverty, racism and a lack of opportunity. According to the Kerner Commission, a major cause was government-sponsored housing segregation that had confined African-Americans to rental housing in urban neighborhoods while subsidizing white flight to the suburbs. Black people, too, wanted to enjoy the benefits of homeownership and the uprisings pressured Washington to take that seriously.
Richard Nixon gave voice to a shift in government policy in 1968 when he declared that “people who own their own homes don’t burn their neighborhoods.” The Housing and Urban Development Act of 1968 created policies that let low-income black renters, long excluded from conventional mortgages and other standard ways of financing homes, become homeowners.
At the core of the law were three components: A down payment cost only $200; a buyer’s mortgage was linked to her income, not her house’s value; and the interest rate on the loan, subsidized by the federal government, was capped at 1 percent.
It was a boon — at least for banks and the real estate industry.
The Federal Housing Administration backed mortgages arranged through this program and bankers didn’t have to worry about foreclosures or defaults because if buyers fell behind on their payment, Washington would simply pay off the loan. An unprecedented number of black renters in Philadelphia, Detroit, Chicago and other urban centers became homeowners.
But the program was troubled from the start. The conditions that allowed for homeownership also set the groundwork for fraud.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
That came afterwards.
This works, but reading leftist rot really isn't worth the effort: https://github.com/iamadamdev/bypass-paywalls-firefox
I volunteered to perform post-construction Inspections for 2 local Habitat chapters a few years ago. The new owners would bitch about colors of paint and flooring, that appliances weren’t upgraded, etc..... and a large part of those materials were donated or provided at cost. After about 6 months of dealing with ingrates it just wasn’t worth it any more.
Thank you. :-)
And they are still trying to blame the subprime mess on the repeal of Glass-Steagel. No mention of Ted Kennedy and Barney Frank in the article.
To be fair and accurate you do own your home. Look at your deed if do not believe this is true. Do you also believe that that the house can “go back to the bank”? News flash the bank does not own the house.
Mis-statement. You NEVER own your home... Not in America today.
Yep. And, around here, many people pay more in property taxes than for the mortgage.
And, when you point out to a Democrat that high property taxes keep people from owning homes, they say people who can’t afford the high property taxes shouldn’t have a house.
My family member was an ED for a chapter. The homeowners - not all, some were very good - had mostly been in public assistance and didn’t know about things like paying on time, doing their own repairs, etc. And because many had lived in public housing, they were used to a miserably, low standard of maintenance.
And then there’s the cultural thing. I was in Israel a couple of weeks ago (doing the basic Holy Land tour with an Israeli guide). We went through the West Bank to Bethlehem, and I saw that the PA had a splendid new palace. We couldn’t get near it.
I
The I noticed a lot of “hate Trump, hate the US” graffiti on the wall, even though we give them bunches of bucks. The
The motto Is: Drop it? Don’t pick it up.
You think Texas is bad? Try New Jersey, mine are around 16K a year
>>To be fair, you don’t really own your home until you pay off your mortgage.
You never own your home - first you rent it from the bank and the government, and then after you ‘pay it off’, you rent it from the government.
Wife wanted us to think about moving to a nicer home 15 miles from here (and 15 miles closer to work). Price is expensive, but not ridiculous for Massachusetts.
Property taxes $24K per year, or $2K per month, so *if* we bought this house, and *if* we paid cash, the rent would only be $2K per month...no thanks, I’ll keep ‘renting’ my current ‘paid-off’ house from the government for $550/month .
One of my the very first things I look at when house shopping is the monthly costs of carrying it - i.e. the things you can never pay off - property taxes and HOA fees among them.
bump
After 30+ years of having a single house, I went to a condo community with an HOA. The snow removal and landscaping costs of my previous home alone come to about 70% of my HOA. Then when you factor in the amenities (i.e. swimming pool, clubhouse, etc.) as well as outside repairs such as roof maintenance, paving, etc., it becomes a wash - at least for me.
Yeah, I couldn’t tell either. Definitely had the look of transition.
At the time bankers were condemned for NOT giving enough loans to black citizens. They were called racists and told they were 'red lining'. In fact bankers were using the same "FICO" standards across the board for blacks and whites, but since a higher percentage of black residents didn't have savings accounts OR pay their bills on time, they were turned down for loans more often.
It wasn't racism - it was reality.
The government stepped in to stop the 'unfairness' and forced banks to make loans they knew would fail. In order to convince banks to go along with this nutty idea, the government agreed to take the risk. (Yes, the idiots in DC were sure it was only prejudice that was making bankers turn away legitimate business)
Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor should go back to the original stories - and pull some quotes from the time... The Times was all in on this insanity.
You own the responsibility for your home from day one... AND you own the right to sell your home.
Just like all those wildly successful countries in Africa.
I thought the banks were ordered to make loans with lower financial standards so that it would ‘be fair,’ against their better business sense but mandated by the House, no?”””
You are correct-—and Tom Steyer is running a current ad here in the Reno market trying to chop the banks for the mortgage ‘crisis’.
I certainly wish someone would explain to him which came first-—the chicken or the egg.
His ads are NOT factual-—and all the verbage he squeaks out is cherry picked out of whole stories.
I wish someone could explain this activity to Tom Steyer & blow holes in his latest ads lambasting the banks.
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