Reports and Studies

This report, commissioned by NeighborWorks America, in partnership with the Atlanta Alliance for Community Development Investment, explores the impact of gentrification on the residents, CBOs and CDCs of three Atlanta neighborhoods in varying stages of gentrification, and their capacity to manage this change. Additionally, in order to understand factors at play in gentrified communities that have experienced a high level of success in managing change, the research was supplemented with information from two neighborhoods outside Atlanta, the Shaw community in Washington, D.C., and Jamaica Plain in Boston. Complete listing and access info »

This popular article from the NeighborWorks Campaign for HomeOwnership reports on research confirming that homeownership is good for families, neighborhoods and the economy Complete listing and access info »

In order to understand the roles that public policy and the business and consumer sectors play in paying for homeownership education and counseling, the costs, benefits and beneficiaries of the education and training must be fully accounted for. This paper estimates the total costs of delivering homeownership education and counseling and discusses proven and implied benefits to stakeholders. Based on one set of assumptions, and depending on the level of activities offered, homeownership education and counseling costs range from $500 to $1,500. Empirical and anecdotal evidence suggest that homeownership education and counseling offer important benefits to borrowers, lenders, real estate professionals and communities. Many nonprofit organizations providing such services, however, remain underfunded. Providers, financial institutions and policy makers must increase their knowledge of what works, what costs are incurred, who benefits, and what value is created by homeownership education and counseling activities in order to develop a sustainable delivery system.

This paper uses information from NeighborWorks organizations that offer homeownership education and counseling programs as illustration of the cost structure of the homeownership education and counseling industry. Part 2 provides background information on the homeownership education and counseling industry. Part 3 explains the methodology and assumptions used for this analysis. Part 4 reviews cost accounting and presents a framework for the cost analysis. Part 5 discusses the value proposition for homeownership education and counseling while Part 6 offers conclusions and implications. Complete listing and access info »

Feedback from eight member organizations interviewed for this five-year report confirms the Multifamily Initiative is helping its members meet their missions, improve the lives of their residents, and grow as viable long-term owners of affordable housing. The overview of the initiative and the stories that follow demonstrate the accomplishments of the Initiative's member organizations over the last five years. Complete listing and access info »

While the overall homeownership rate in the United States is at an all-time high, the gap between the ownership rates of low-income and higher-income households remains wide. In addition, homeownership rates in urban, low-income and minority communities lag behind. Lower-income families are constrained a lack of information about how to buy a home, by their inability to provide sufficient, stable income streams for debt service, by their lack of initial equity, and by their inability to find an home of adequate quality in a desirable location. This paper explores each of these constraints, or gaps, and potential solutions for each. We find addressing each of these gaps involves trade-offs, yet targeting the appropriate strategy for particular markets and populations may be able to help families become home owners. Information gaps are best addressed by programs that provide home buyer counseling and education. Federal funding and incentives for such programs have been declining throughout the last decade, however. Unless new homebuyers are well-prepared and supported, none of the sophisticated development and financial strategies will be successful. Income and wealth gaps are closely linked; bridging a wealth gap for a buyer, for example, may increase the buyer's income gap. While there are several strategies that seek to bridge these twin barriers, the most promising among them is the second mortgage. The supply gap is most pressing in faster-growing coastal cities, but is becoming a more significant constraint to homeownership nationally. Unfortunately, reliance on filtering and other traditional mechanisms for creating affordable homeownership opportunities has not proven effective in recent years. Serious consideration should be paid to new production programs and policies that can enhance the supply of affordable owner-occupied units in targeted areas. Overall, a menu of strategies exists, each being appropriate for targeted households in a given housing market context. More attention needs to be focused on this menu, rather than a one-size fits all strategy. Complete listing and access info »

This paper examines the rationale for mixed-income approaches to affordable housing development, as well as the record of such developments in meeting their objectives, from the perspective of housing developers and those responsible for designing housing programs and policies. The drivers of the recent, renewed emphasis on a mixed-income housing projects are also examined and analyzed. The potential benefits this mixed-income approaches are summarized based on existing literature and interviews with key informants. Overall, this paper finds mixed-income approaches can have an important role in getting additional affordable units built, ensuring high-quality housing, and deconcentrating poverty. However, mixed-income housing is not a silver bullet to overcoming the difficult challenges faced by families seeking to escape from poverty or the realities of housing markets. Because mixed-income developments are complex, present unique risks, and often house fewer needy families than other types of development, mixed-income approaches must carefully consider the local housing market, the population to be served, financing options, the scale of the project, and the community context. This paper concludes by discussing the implications of these findings and suggests guiding questions for developers and policy makers considering mixed-income projects and policies. Complete listing and access info »

Congress included a special $5 million, mixed-income demonstration program in Neighborhood Reinvestment Corporation's FY 2003 appropriation. The purpose of the set-aside was to explore approaches for serving households with incomes less than 30 percent of the area median ("extremely low income" or "ELI" households) in mixed-income communities. This paper shares highlights of the 21 grant applications (17 of which have been selected for funding) and how the special congressional funding made a distinct difference in the projects. Complete listing and access info »

Metropolitan Atlanta is experiencing a foreclosure boom as the number of failed mortgages more than doubled in less than five years, between 2000 and 2005. These foreclosures impose significant costs not only on borrowers and lenders, but also on municipal governments, neighboring homeowners and others with a financial interest in nearby properties. As a result, foreclosure avoidance strategies must involve not only federal, state and local public agencies, but also responsible mortgage industry officials, consumer groups, and community-based, not-for profit organizations. This report was commissioned by Doug Dylla at NeighborWorks America to help build awareness of foreclosure problems and craft a comprehensive foreclosure-avoidance strategy for metropolitan Atlanta. The work presented here serves as a companion to the Foreclosure Prevention Forum cosponsored by NeighborWorks America and the Atlanta Federal Reserve on May 23, 2005. The forum brought together more than 150 leaders from the mortgage industry, state and local government, the advocacy community, and academic and policy researchers. These participants generated a variety of collaborative approaches to address issues related to mortgage failures and foreclosures in the Atlanta region.

The report was written and researched by Mark Duda and William Apgar. It expands on research presented by Duda at the forum and is intended to characterize the current situation with respect to mortgage failures in metropolitan Atlanta, as well as previous research completed by the authors on foreclosure avoidance in Chicago and Los Angeles. The foreclosure data used in this report were generously provided by EquiSystems, LLC, producer of the Atlanta Foreclosure Report. Complete listing and access info »

The recent rise in nonprime mortgage foreclosures has opened a new and costly chapter in many of the nation's most distressed urban neighborhoods. Particularly problematic is the fact that today's foreclosures impose significant costs not only on borrowers and lenders, but also on municipal governments, neighboring homeowners and others with a financial interest in nearby properties. While there is an extensive literature on the impact that delinquency, default, and foreclosure have on lenders, borrowers, and other entities that are direct parties to the mortgage transaction in question, the costs that these mortgage failures impose on municipalities and other third parties are far less well understood. This is due to two factors. First, municipal and other third party costs are difficult to identify, and therefore often go undetected. Second, even where identified, the activities that generate costs often blend in with other governmental functions, or are otherwise difficult to quantify, reinforcing the tendency for them to remain invisible.

This study attempts to fill that void. Using the City of Chicago as a case in point, this study presents a conceptual framework that makes explicit the various costs of foreclosure, especially as they relate to local governments and courts. By carefully reviewing the foreclosure process as it plays out in Chicago, the paper isolates 26 separate costs incurred for the provision of 'foreclosure related services.' These costs reflect actions undertaken by 15 separate governmental units that are part of the overall municipal infrastructure underlying the foreclosure process. While in some cases these municipal activities are limited to simple and relatively inexpensive ministerial duties of agencies like the Recorder of Deeds, in more complex foreclosure scenarios these municipal costs can reach tens of thousands of dollars. In extreme cases, the concentrated foreclosures can put downward pressure on area property values and indirectly rob area homeowners of hundreds of thousands of dollars of home equity. Complete listing and access info »

As one NeighborWorks executive director quipped, "New rural America? What's wrong with the old rural America?"




We all like the old rural America. But as the Kellogg Foundation's recent series, Perceptions of Rural America, amply illustrates, our perceptions are outdated. All too often we allow fond memories and impressions passed down for generations to cloud our ability to see not only what is truly happening in rural America but what can happen.




In a very real sense this symposium was not about "out with the old and in with the new" but rather "here is a clarion call to recognize and encourage innovation so that what we all truly value in rural America can be preserved." Over 150 participants from 35 states, the District of Colombia, Indian Country and Puerto Rico, all engaged their colleagues and themselves in a series of lively discussions about the new rural America on December 10 in San Francisco.




The true value of any Symposium may rest not so much in the degree to which participants are stimulated in the moment, but the degree to which the content of the day adds value to the community development field over time. In that spirit, we offer this synopsis of the day. We are deliberately not trying to capture every stray thought but, rather, highlight those elements that are most likely to draw you into further inquiry.
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