Dr. Bernice King, daughter of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in an image from LBJ Foundation, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
Racial discrimination in housing was cited over the last decade by multiple think tanks as one of the leading drivers of the racial wealth gap in the United States. Policies and practices like redlining and discriminatory lending have contributed to the fact that, in 2019, the average white family had nearly six times the wealth of the average Black family, according to recent research. And it appeared that the pandemic widened the gap.. Homeownership – a significant factor of wealth generation – reflects a similar disparity. White families had a 75.8% homeownership rate in 2020, compared to Black families’ 46.4% homeownership rate, according to the National Association of Realtors.
There are organizations working to combat that reality, but few are Black-centered like the recently organized Ready for Life, created by former White House advisor Ashley Bell and Dr. Bernice King, the daughter of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. The financial startup, set to launch on Labor Day 2022, was created to assist prospective Black homeowners in qualifying for mortgages. Typically, financial institutions rely heavily on credit scores to accept or deny potential loans for applicants. Ready for Life, in contrast, created a mobile banking platform that tracks applicants’ on-time rent payment history as a substitute for relying on a person’s credit history, which usually doesn’t account for rental payments.
King said that she believes this work is a direct extension of her father’s activism for racial justice in the United States. Dr. King, his daughter said, “wanted to challenge our country to open pathways economically for the Black community, because one of the major avenues to create wealth is homeownership.” Bell articulated a similar philosophy for their new organization, telling the Atlanta Journal-Constitution that Ready for Life was dedicated to addressing the struggle for Black families to build generational wealth. “This is an opportunity to create a new system and new path for home ownership because what we are [currently] doing does not work,” Bell said.
Robert F. Smith Takes on Racial Disparities in Housing
Robert F. Smith, Founder, Chairman, and CEO of Vista Equity Partners, has a history of advocacy against racial discrimination, including in housing. The Southern Communities Initiative, which Smith co-founded alongside Dan Schulman and Rich Lesser, supports six Southern cities’ efforts to address inequities in education, healthcare, workforce development, digital access and housing. Central to The Southern Communities Initiative’s work in housing is expanding Black families’ access to capital via community development financial institutions (CDFIs) – commonly known as community lenders – as well as minority depository institutions (MDIs). By modernizing CDFI/MDI systems, as well as hiring and training more workers to support them, The Southern Communities Initiative aims to alleviate the barriers these institutions face in providing necessary capital to the communities they serve.
Smith has also supported the King family. His purchase of Dr. King’s Atlanta birth home – transferring it to the National Park Service to preserve it – was praised by Bernice King, who is the Atlanta community lead for the Southern Communities Initiative, and the National Park Foundation. Of that donation, Smith said he felt he was on a mission “to educate the world as to what African Americans have contributed in America and educate Americans as to what our contributions have led to and so many great things that make America the unique place it is on the planet.”
Learn more about the Southern Communities Initiative plans to end housing discrimination.
