Nadia Evangelou, NAR Research
Homeownership trends for minority groups this year
D
uring the pandemic, a booming housing market has contributed significantly to the recovery of the U.S. economy. Home sales activity rose to its highest level in 14 years in 2020. And with an uptick in home sales came other economic boosts: with each home sale, there are expenditures related to lawn care, home remodeling, new furniture, mortgage origination, moving and an inducement to build new homes. The National Association of REALTORS® estimates that every home sale generates $89,000 in the national and local economy. The impact is even stronger in the District of Columbia, with every home sale contributing $185,000 to its economy. (For more context on our region: the economic impact of a home sale in Maryland is $97,000.) Nevertheless, not all families have the same opportunities to own a home, with many facing additional hurdles. Indeed, there are sizable differences in the homeownership rate among minorities, with the rate of homeownership for minority families lagging behind the national average. As a result, the net worth for minority families is also lower. At $188,200, the net worth of a typical White family was nearly eight times greater than that of a Black family ($24,100) in 2019.
Specifically, the homeownership rate for White Americans has consistently been nearly 70% since 2017. In the same period, the homeownership rate for Black Americans has been nearly 30 percentage points lower than that of White Americans—a few points above 41% from 2017 on. For Hispanic Americans, the homeownership rate has held at a few points above 47%, and for Asian Americans it has Homeownership rates by race (2009-2019) been above 59% over the 69.8% 71.0% same time period. Moreover, in the last 10 years, 60.7% while the homeownership 59.5% rate fell for all races, except for Asian Americans, Black Americans still experienced the largest decline in home48.1% 48.1% ownership. 44.5% 42.0%
2009 Race
2010 White
2011
2012
Black
Source: NAR calculations of ACS PUMS data
24
CAPITAL AREA REALTOR ® — March/April 2021
2013 Asian
2014 Hispanic
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
