Creating Opportunities for Homeownership
The U.S. housing crisis continues to threaten the gains that low-income and minority families have made toward economic security and opportunity. More than 3 million mortgages across the country are in foreclosure, up 81 percent from 2007. Credit Suisse/First Boston Analytics estimates that there will be as many as 10 million total foreclosures nationally as a result of the subprime crisis, the credit crunch and the current recession. In response, the Ford Foundation is stepping up its efforts to preserve homeownership for low-income and minority families. We have committed an initial $11.1 million for this work.
In September 2008, we hosted a Ford Foundation Forum — the first in our series of public conversations about critical issues facing our world — to assess how the housing crisis is affecting communities of color and what we can do going forward.
The Dream Deferred: Minority Homeownership at a Crossroads
Click on the pictures below to select from seven short highlights.
About Our Panelists
Vikas Bajaj (Moderator)
Housing and Business Reporter, The New York Times
Vikas Bajaj joined The New York Times in 2005. He has covered housing and financial markets for the business desk of the paper since 2006, offering insightful analysis and coverage of the fallout of the mortgage lending boom.
Thasunda B. Duckett
Senior Vice President, Northeast Division Manager, Chase Mortgage
Thasunda Brown Duckett leads a team of more than 700 sales professionals who advise and originate loans for home buyers in New York, New Jersey and the New England region. Her group generated approximately $8 billion in funded loans in 2008.
Martin Eakes
Founder and CEO, Self-Help
Martin Eakes has guided the community development lender in Durham, N.C., through establishing the Center for Responsible Lending and providing more than $5.24 billion in financing to 60,130 homebuyers, small businesses and nonprofits.
Marc H. Morial
President and CEO, National Urban League
Marc Morial is president and CEO the nation's largest and oldest civil rights organization devoted to empowering African Americans and other ethnic communities to enter the economic and social mainstream.
Nicolas P. Retsinas
Director, Joint Center for Housing Studies, Harvard University
Nicolas Retsinas has overseen the center's research on critical U.S. housing and community development issues since 1998. He served as assistant secretary for housing-federal housing commissioner at the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development.
Diana L. Taylor
Managing Director, Wolfensohn & Company
Chair, FDIC Advisory Committee on Economic Inclusion (ComE-IN)
Diana Taylor has been at the private investment firm since 2007 and previously served as superintendent of banks for New York State. In 2006, she was appointed chair of ComE-IN, which advises the FDIC on how to expand access to banking services for the underserved.
About Our Grant Making
Since 1996, Ford has provided more than $153 million in grants and more than $70 million in program-related investments to innovative programs that increase homeownership opportunities for minority and low-income families in the United States. Beginning in 2007, we committed more than $17 million in grants for work related to the housing crisis.
In collaboration with peer foundations, government entities, community groups, and banks and lending institutions, we work to provide affordable financing to homeowners, encourage responsible lending by the financial system, and educate consumers about predatory lending practices and responsible borrowing. Our goal is to keep as many homeowners in their homes as possible and to limit the downward spiral of neighborhoods impacted by mortgage foreclosures and vacant properties.
Recent grants include: