$8. Not a typo. In last week's Boston Globe Spotlight Team series on race in Boston, this jumped off the screen. $8 is the median net worth of non-immigrant African-American households in the Boston area compared to $247,500 for white households. Other households of color have a net worth ranging from $0 to a high of $12,000. Differences in homeownership rates are the biggest contributor to these sobering figures.
Reality hits home and our homebuyers are working hard to close that gap every day. Take Ivelisse Caraballo. She lives in Dorchester and has a good job at UMass Boston. She wanted to stay in the city. She also wanted to buy a home. But given median home prices soaring to record levels, she couldn’t have both. The good news is that Ivelisse closed on a single-family home this fall thanks, in part, to MAHA’s homebuyer education and community organizing. The bad news is that Boston has lost another homeowner of color to Brockton, and that Ivelisse has doubled her commute to work, leaving her less time with family, friends, and giving back to her community. We see the same story repeated over and over.
Reversing this pattern starts with you. By supporting MAHA’s homeownership education and organizing and making a year-end gift, you ensure that people like Ivelisse can access affordable and sustainable homeownership, and that we can continue to close the racial homeownership gap and build more equity in our communities. Please donate today.
