Lately we’ve read reports that mortgages are harder to come by for some minorities, but today a new report [pdf] is out that immigrants — 1.5 million of whom have moved to NYC since 1990 — in New York City are hit hardest by the whole big mess of housing crisis. “The real estate run-up and ensuing credit crisis has exacerbated an already grim housing situation for New York City immigrants,” writes the NY Times. “Immigrants who own homes pay far more of their incomes for housing, on average, than native-born New Yorkers, and may have been vulnerable to subprime lending.” Foreclosures pervade neighborhoods with large concentrations of immigrants, including Bushwick, East Flatbush and Flatlands, and some private equity investors have engaged in questionable tactics, buying property and tying to force folks out to raise the rent. It’s not that the rent is actually higher in some of these properties; part of the problem comes from a kind of wage racism. “According to a 2005 study quoted in the report, immigrants actually pay less in absolute rent than native-born Americans, but their incomes are lower.”
Housing Crisis Hurts Immigrants More [NY Times]
Photo by rich_awn.