The National Council of La Raza (NCLR) is the largest national Hispanic constituency-based civil rights organization in the U.S. As an organization committed to reducing poverty and improving life opportunities for the nation’s more than 40 million Hispanics, NCLR pursues research, advocacy, and programmatic initiatives aimed at increasing and maintaining Hispanic homeownership. In 1997, Hispanic homeownership rates trailed White homeownership by 29 points. In an effort to reduce this gap, NCLR created the NCLR Homeownership Network (NHN) to provide pre-purchase homeownership counseling directly to the Hispanic community.
Today, NHN consists of 43 NCLR affiliates in 20 states, and 31 different markets. Community-based nonprofits are incorporated into NHN based on an annual application process that evaluates quality of services provided, program history, and need for counseling services in the area. Once incorporated, NHN agencies receive operating grants and technical assistance from NCLR.
The NHN homeownership counseling model emphasizes one-on-one counseling where trained counselors work with low-income families over a period of time to help them become mortgage-ready. This individual attention is critical to low-income Latino families who may be unfamiliar with the homebuying process. Approximately 80% of NHN clients are not ready to immediately purchase a home. NHN affiliates help these clients to identify their barriers to homeownership and establish short- and long-term goals that will help them become mortgage-ready.
In the 2004-05 program year, NHN began piloting post-purchase counseling services through a subset of NHN members such as anti-predatory lending and default and delinquency counseling. These individualized services are critical to victims of unethical lending practices or families facing a financial emergency. Housing counselors play a pivotal role as independent, third-parties that offer non-biased information and advice to these vulnerable families.
The demand for financial and homeownership counseling is growing. More Hispanic families are engaging the homebuying market than in previous years, which also translates into an increased exposure to predatory lending, consumer debt, and home maintenance costs. Pre-purchase housing counseling not only helps families achieve homeownership, but also teaches them how to maintain their investment.
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