Self-Help Perspectives - Issue 1
First issue of Self-Help's quarterly newsletter, Self-Help Perspectives. December 2007.
Welcome to the first edition of Self-Help Perspectives, a quarterly email newsletter providing information on issues and ideas important to Self-Help, our industry, and our constituents. This issue focuses on our response to the subprime mortgage crisis. Future issues will cover initiatives throughout the organization from commercial lending to environmental stewardship to real estate development.
We welcome your comments and suggestions for topics of interest.
Thank you for your interest and support.
Responding to the Subprime Crisis
The consequences of reckless subprime lending have been a growing concern, and rightfully so. One in five families with a subprime loan made from 1998 through 2006 have already lost, or will lose, their home to foreclosure in the next few years. These losses add up to as much as $164 billion in lost equity for families. As is usually the case with predatory lending products, people of color are being disproportionately affected: 53% of African-Americans who bought homes in 2006 received a subprime loan, and 42% of Latino families. By contrast, only 22% of white borrowers received these high-cost loans. Visit Self-Help affiliate Center for Responsible Lending for more information, data sources, and a snapshot of the subprime crisis.
We view this growing foreclosure crisis as a direct threat to the people we serve and to our mission of creating and protecting ownership and economic opportunity for people of color, women, rural residents, and low-wealth families and communities.
Self-Help and Center for Responsible Lending (CRL), in collaboration with a network of partner organizations, are pursuing a range of policy and program options to address this crisis. In addition to continuing to offer fair and affordable alternatives to predatory mortgage loans, we are actively working to help families already trapped in subprime loans, to help stabilize neighborhoods threatened by outbreaks of foreclosures, and to promote legislation to help curtail this type of reckless lending in the future. Our current initiatives include the following...
Durham Homeowner Gives Back With New House
Self-Help Borrower Success Story
Two years ago, Carline Jules had to help her 6-year-old son, Jaden, do his homework at night under the interior light of her car. It was their only shelter. "He thought it was camping," Carline says.
Carline, who immigrated to the United States from Haiti in 1981, earned a bachelor's degree in business administration from the University of Maryland at College Park in 1996. She moved to North Carolina for her job as a financial analyst.
After a difficult divorce Carline's financial situation became unstable. She couldn't pay her bills and many of her accounts went to collection.
"I couldn't get up I was so depressed," she says. "I didn't care, I begged God to kill me. One day I came back to my house and every door was locked... I had no clothes, no food, no husband, no nothing."
Featured Partner: NAACP
North Carolina and National Partnership
Self-Help/Center for Responsible Lending is a life member of the National NAACP, and works in partnership with the organization at the state and national level. Julian Bond, NAACP's Chairman, serves on CRL's board of directors and has been a vocal advocate against payday lending. Under Chairman Bond's leadership, the NAACP has passed several resolutions denouncing payday lending and refuses to accept financial contributions from payday lenders. He also drafted letters supporting legislation regulating payday lenders nationwide, and opposing their operation and practice of targeting the working poor and communities of color in DC.
Hilary Shelton, NAACP DC Bureau Director, is another fierce advocate against abusive mortgage lending practices. Hilary testified against these practices to the Senate Banking Committee, and is working with members of Congress to educate them on predatory mortgage lending's impact on communities of color.
The NC chapter of the NAACP has provided tremendous leadership on mortgage lending issues in North Carolina and nationally. The chapter provided leadership during the 1999 NC campaign to rein in the first wave of abusive mortgage lending, helping to pass the first state anti-predatory lending legislation in the country. NAACP NC helped again in 2001 when the NC General Assembly passed the mortgage broker licensing statute.
Under Reverend Barber's leadership, the NAACP worked with CRL to pass new predatory lending legislation in 2007. Reverend Barber worked on proposed federal mortgage lending legislation and to ensure that federal legislation will not preempt current NC law. The NC chapter was also instrumental in organizing a historic lobbying day at the NC Capitol where it highlighted issues that it would like addressed legislatively.
Reverend Barber was the keynote speaker at this year's LCCR southern regional conference, co-sponsored by Self-Help/CRL. His speech was very moving, a reminder that we still have much to do in our quest for equal justice.
Sustainable Design Meets Affordability
Self-Help, Advanced Energy and Design Students Break Ground with New Home Design
Self-Help and Advanced Energy recently broke ground on a new affordable green home. The house was designed by a team of NC State University students who won a Sustainable Building Design Competition. The new home will include sustainable features and materials such as foam wall panels, a manifold hot water system, bamboo flooring and a sealed crawl space.
The NC Sustainable Building Design Competition began in 2000 as a way to encourage students in universities, colleges, and community colleges to learn and apply the lessons of sustainable design and construction. Student teams design a home for a particular region applying a sustainable approach that includes energy efficiency, renewable energy, building science, indoor environmental quality, water conservation, materials selection, affordability, and more.
Self-Help and Advanced Energy have worked to build houses that are as energy efficient as possible. It's good for homeowners and good for the environment. "Energy efficient homes for everyone, and especially lower-income families, just make sense," said Keith Aldridge, managing director of Advanced Energy's Applied Building Science team. "We want to illustrate that everyone can have a healthier, safer, more durable, comfortable and energy efficient home."
New Book FORCES FOR GOOD Explores What Makes Great Nonprofits Great
Self-Help Cited by Authors
Self-Help was identified as one of the 12 highest-impact nonprofits in a survey of nearly 3,000 nonprofit CEOs and 60 in-depth interviews. The new book, FORCES FOR GOOD: The Six Practices of High-Impact Nonprofits, features the research and findings of long-time nonprofit consultants Leslie Crutchfield and Heather McLeod Grant. The authors uncovered six powerful practices used by these high-impact nonprofits. The book, published by Jossey-Bass, was released on October 26, 2007.
Learn more at: forcesforgood.net
More news about Self-Help, our borrowers, and partners is always available on the news section of our website.
Self-Help is a community development lender and real estate developer headquartered in Durham, North Carolina, with offices throughout the state and in Washington, DC, and California. Visit our Locations Map for contact information or email us with your comments.
Self-Help: Creating and protecting ownership and economic opportunity for people of color, women, rural residents, and low-wealth families and communities.
