Housing Markets and Choice

Despite substantial progress since passage of the Fair Housing Act four decades ago, neighborhoods remain highly segregated by race and ethnicity. This paper summarizes existing research evidence on both the costs of segregation and the potential benefits of neighborhood diversity. It uses decennial census data to show that a growing share of US neighborhoods are racially and ethnically diverse, but that low-income African Americans in particular remain highly concentrated in predominantly minority neighborhoods. Because the dynamics that sustain segregation today are complex, strategies for overcoming them must address not only discrimination, but information gaps, affordability constraints, prejudice, and fear.

Neighborhoods likely to be the hardest hit by foreclosure impacts in 2009 are those that experienced the highest densities of subprime (high-cost) lending during the peak 2004-2006 period. This brief examines patterns of such lending in the 100 largest metropolitan areas. The very highest subprime densities were found in minority neighborhoods that were, interestingly, at the higher rather than the lower end of the income spectrum. But there was considerable variety in characteristics among the most troubled. Of the fifth of census tracts that ranked highest in subprime density, 35 percent had predominantly white populations and 60 percent were in the suburbs.

Every parent recognizes the inextricable connections between where we live and the quality of our children’s education. Although public policies have historically contributed to disparities in both neighborhood affordability and school quality, federal programs focused on affordable housing rarely take public schools into account and school officials typically assume that they have no influence over housing patterns. This paper focuses on four principles regarding the vitality and performance of schools and communities, discussing opportunities for constructive policy interventions, summarizing what we know about their likely effectiveness, and recommending next steps for the Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Department of Education.

This brief reviews recent social and economic trends in the ten metropolitan areas that form the context for the neighborhood programs being operated as a part of the Annie E. Casey Foundation's Making Connections initiative. It finds that these areas are strikingly different along a number dimensions and in are many ways representative of the diversity in conditions and trends across America's metropolitan areas. Since 2002, for example, two of these areas attained among the nation's highest rates of employment growth (Denver and Seattle) while two others experienced serious declines (Oakland and Milwaukee). Although there were important differences in magnitudes, all sites did share in a number of trends: minority groups growing as a share of total population, improvements in several social indicators (e.g., in crime and teen pregnancy) but, disturbingly, notable increases in child poverty.

The foreclosure crisis is now having dramatic effects throughout America. In mid-2008, recognizing that this phenomenon was still quite new, the Open Society Institute asked the Urban Institute to scan available research to document what we know about: (1) the way foreclosures impact families; (2) how foreclosures affect communities; and (3) the efforts now underway, or being suggested, to address the crisis, focusing on actions at the local level. This report summarizes a longer report presenting the results of this review.