In the United States in 2002 President Bush set a goal of helping 5.5 million minority families to buy their own homes before the decade ends in a bid to end “home ownership gap.”  President George W. Bush toured neighbourhoods transformed by federal dollars into a mixed-income community and pledged new aid to help the 5.5 million blacks and Hispanics buy homes. Bush’s ambitious home ownership plan envisaged a $200 million expansion to the American Dream Down Payment Fund. Grants from this fund would help around 40,000 families make down payments or to pay closing costs on the purchase of houses, in a year.  He also emphasized the need for the private sector to build more low cost homes.  He proposed to extend tax credits of nearly $2.4 billion over a period of five years towards building affordable single family homes.  This tax incentive is expected to boost construction of low cost homes to the tune of 200,000 during this period.

SLU Home Ownership Plan

The Saint Louis University Home Ownership Plan was launched to help the employees of the university to obtain financial assistance to buy a home. This program was aimed at helping them by their own homes in the Midtown area. This is a community based initiative known as Hometown SLU.  Hometown SLU is supported by Fannie Mae, US Bank, Cendant Mortgage, Commerce Bank and the City of St. Louis.  Under this scheme, the eligible full time employees who desire to reside in the designated area are extended a loan of 5% of the purchase amount to buy a home.  These loans are forgivable for five years on the condition that they still remain employees of the SLU and their main home is the one bought using the loan.  The Mayor of the city of St. Louis opined that this initiative would stabilize the neighbourhoods in addition to increasing the property values in that locality and offered to help the project to succeed.  The participants of the program have a choice of two areas around the SLU.  

Helpingthepeople.org assists Americans who are planning to buy their own homes.  They educate, coach and also guide the potential or existing homeowners during the process towards home ownership. They believe that home ownership helps build stronger communities, strengthen families and also creates stability for the children. They organize two consecutive 2 hour seminars in various locations with presentations by qualified and experienced home ownership covering the various documentation and disclosures in the home buying procedure. These clients would enrol in the home ownership coaching program and undergo no cost private training. After they obtain the conditional loan approval, they will begin the home search with the help of the People Home ownership Resource centre.  

Co-Opportunity

Co-opportunity.org home ownership program teaches the skills that are needed to buy and maintain a home. Their staff consists of certified professionals in housing counselling and housing finance. Their program consists of four components namely Counselling, Education, Planning and maintenance.  The counselling unit helps you to assess and find out if you are ready to buy your own home. Education teaches the home ownership concepts such as principles of borrowing, money management, how to shop around for the ideal house and how to deal with realtors, appraisers and the attorneys.  The planning section helps you in finding the house, financing the home purchase and to overcome problems of bad credit history.