One way we’ll define success is by meaningfully closing the homeownership gaps that exist between Black, Latino and white households in the city. In Milwaukee, MGIC and several lenders are part of a collective action effort to address racial equity challenges in homeownership. You’re not extending a hand to the community, you’re reaching into it to understand the challenges and how you can help. Second, commit to “inreach” and not outreach. If your collective efforts are successful, the opportunity for more transactions will come.
Focus on building relationships and not simply doing more transactions. First and foremost, be relational, not transactional. However, by being a participant in such efforts – or perhaps by helping lead them – contributions of your time, talent, expertise and investment can make a big difference.Īs you contemplate this opportunity, the right mindset is critical. It will take coordinated and collective action involving multiple stakeholders over the long term to move the needle. So what can a mortgage lender do? The answer is: take “collective action.” None of these issues can be addressed solely by the good work of a single market participant. These are barriers endemic to neighborhoods and populations beset by persistently lower homeownership rates, and much work must be done to address them long before a 1003 is completed and signed. While the mortgage toolkit may offer many loan options, none address systemic housing affordability, supply, valuation, or property issues nor do any prudently provide sustainable long-term homeownership to borrowers who are not yet prepared and ready to own a home.
Mortgage lenders, after all, primarily affect change in one way – by originating a mortgage loan that helps a family attain their dream of homeownership and spurs wealth creation through home price appreciation. Moving the needle in your target communitiesĮvery mortgage lender has certainly faced the frustration of not being able to help a borrower overcome fundamental barriers to eligibility, such as income, credit, lack of affordable housing supply, appraisal issues and property condition challenges.
And in Part 3, Danny Garcia-Velez expanded on the concept of education and the systems and practices in place to help applicants who aren’t yet mortgage ready overcome barriers they face that may not be within their control.įor today’s topic, Community, we discuss how to push for and obtain results in your community by way of coordinated and collective action with other key stakeholders. In the second article, Vance Edwards addressed building awareness with “mortgage ready” Americans. In the first article of this series, I laid out 4 areas any racial equity plan should attempt to address: Awareness, Readiness, Community and Solutions (ARCS). This is the fourth in our 5-part Affordable Homeownership Series: Addressing the racial equity gap in homeownership