Fresh from a day spent stressing to Congressional members the importance of keeping banks out of real estate and pressing them to pass the legislation proposed by the National Association of Realtors, NAR president Martin Edwards, Jr. turns his attention to another crisis - housing opportunities for low to middle income families.

“Nearly 13 million people – that’s 5.4 million families – have critical housing needs. And it’s not just the poor. In fact, moderate-income working families now make up the fastest growing segment of the population that’s shut out of the housing market,” says Edwards.

The availability of affordable rentals, as well as affordable first-time home purchases for potential homebuyers, is critical because they are the first rung of the housing ladder. If they can't advance, neither does the housing market, believed by many to be underpinning the shaky American economy.

Despite relaxed lending guidelines, housing prices are continuing to rise, locking many out of the American dream of home ownership and decent rental homes.

Edwards says that NAR has made affordable housing a national priority and is pursuing initiatives it believes will help ease affordability.

The NAR's new Housing Opportunities Program, for example, is an aggressive effort to stimulate affordable housing, by improving access to all types of available housing in both the rental and home ownership markets.

"Where we are involved is in the community," says Edwards. "We have 1600 boards where we are going to help them organize the data and give them central data."

The data will be housed on a new Internet site to be tested in August and debuted nationally by the end of this year. It will be "the No.1 place to find homeownership opportunity information." It will include research, communications, and a place to support housing legislation, such as tax credits for single-family homes.

"This is a change in philosophy," vows Edwards. "If Realtors aren't involved, who will be? We know who the players are and how to develop it.These are the things we can be part of."

But Edwards knows he's in for an uphill battle. "The most difficult thing is how to move the issues," he says. "We can get some things done through taxation, but we also have to pitch in at the local level."

To help increase housing opportunities, NAR is promoting a national housing opportunity symposium, followed by regional symposiums; involvement in the U.S. Conference of Mayors’ National Housing Forum; partnership with Habitat for Humanity; and partnership with the Community Homeownership Credit Coalition.

NAR also has joined a White House initiative that seeks ways to increase the ranks of minority homeowners. Another NAR program, called the HOPE Awards, was established last year to identify and recognize individuals and organizations that have promoted homeownership among minorities.

"My message is we have to stop tearing down existing housing and retain that housing in redevelopment," says Edwards. "We can't as a nation sustain going out and building new because we aren't going to be able to pay for it. Why should we when we can retain, renovate and improve housing where people want to live? Housing can be redeveloped where you already have sewers and roads."

It isn't going to happen overnight, says Edwards. "The boards will find programs that fit their communities, they are doing programs now that are very successful. We are going to provide a lot of data at the national level on what they can accomplish."

"We can't continue to throw housing away," says Edwards. "We need to learn from our neighbors in Europe to build them right, keep them up, renovate and reuse. Here we have housing being torn down every day because it hasn't been cared for - how can we help them renovate and help seniors live where they want to live? We must focus more attention on the problem."

“Besides focusing public attention on minority homeownership, our programs is also designed to convince policymakers that the time has come to place a higher priority on creating greater equality in homeownership,” Edwards said. “We believe that by working to increase minority homeownership, the housing industry can collectively help to make real the promises contained in the Fair Housing Act. Realtors are actively engaged and committed to making a difference; together we can ease the burden of housing affordability and create more housing opportunities for all Americans.”

Published: June 13, 2002

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