In short, owning a home gives people a reason to care about what goes on around them. It gives them a stake in where they live. And that makes all the difference. Beyond that, this project shows that communities can pull together to make a real difference in people's lives. If more than 400 members of the U.S. House of Representatives can find a way to get past politics and partisanship to build a home, surely the rest of us can contribute in our own ways to our neighborhoods and communities.
Recent news is good.
After declining during the 1980s, the homeownership rate is once again increasing. Even more encouraging, these gains were broadly distributed. Still, there is much work to be done. Despite the recent gains in minority and low-income homeownership, many groups still lag behind the national average. National Homeownership Week offers a prime chance to reflect on the positive results homeownership brings to our neighborhoods.