Stricter Enforcement of Housing Anti-Discrimination Laws
There are a plethora of ways Black would-be homeowners are discriminated against when trying to get mortgage loans or otherwise fund their efforts to purchase a home, a major gateway to attaining overall wealth. Critics believe stricter enforcement of anti-discrimination laws could help level the playing field and get more Black people to own a home. “Things like the mortgage interest tax deduction provide a high benefit to people who earn at the top of the income distribution, whereas those who earn at the bottom earn very little of that deduction, and that’s because it’s based on house values,” a senior policy analyst at Demos and co-author of “The Racial Wealth Gap: Why Policy Matters” told Forbes.
Authorizing Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to Help Homeowners in Financial Turmoil
Discriminatory practices by banks and other lenders leave Black people facing subprime mortgages far more often than their white counterparts. This ultimately forces them into financial turmoil as they try to pursue one of the key pieces of the puzzle to building their wealth. The authors of “The Racial Wealth Gap: Why Policy Matters” proposed that authorizing Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to “modify mortgages in ways that make them more sustainable” could help decrease the size of the racial wealth gap.
