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Homeownership is out of reach for many Americans — especially for Black Americans.

In the country’s largest metropolitan areas, Black people own a disproportionately small share of homes relative to population size, according to a new report from LendingTree.

In 2022, Black people made up an average of 14.99% of the population across the 50 largest metropolitan areas of the U.S., but owned an average of 10.15% of owner-occupied homes in such places, the report found. Those figures are roughly flat from 2021.

“Relatively speaking, Black people don’t own that many homes,” said Jacob Channel, a senior economist at LendingTree who authored the study.

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In Memphis, Tennessee, Black people make up nearly half the population, the largest share among all metros in the study. But they only own about 36% of homes in the area, LendingTree found.

LendingTree analyzed the U.S. Census Bureau’s 2022 American Community Survey with one-year estimates. The study ranks the nation’s 50 largest metropolitan statistical areas by the difference between the percentage of owner-occupied homes in a metro owned by those who identify as Black and the share of an area’s population that identifies as Black.

Black people face ‘disproportionately steep hurdles’

Another element that comes into play is the tax system.

The tax code has a mortgage interest deduction that “overwhelmingly benefits people who can already afford a home,” said Sarah Hassmer, the director of housing justice at the National Women’s Law Center, a nonprofit organization based in Washington, D.C.

“There are some localities [offering] down payment assistance programs, which are a promising practice, but that is not a lived reality in our federal tax code yet,” Hassmer said.

Down payment assistance is a form of direct payment program that can help people who can already afford a monthly mortgage payment. However, the initial down payment is often the barrier of entry, Hassmer said.

While there are many more structural hurdles that impede homeownership for Black people in the U.S., experts agree that it’s important to keep focus on the issue.

“It’s not going to disappear overnight,” Channel said. “We can’t just burry our heads in the sand and hope and pray one day racial inequality in the U.S. suddenly disappears. That’s obviously not going to happen unless we really work towards it.” 

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Post source: cnbc

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