Home Mortgage Disclosure Act numbers for 2009 show a welcome trend—home loans to minorities increased by more than 8%, after a whopping 45% decrease in 2008.
Not all minorities saw an increase, though, and minority percentage of total volume was flat.
According to data they filed with the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council, a unit of the Federal Reserve, 8,037 lenders made $370 billion in mortgages to African Americans, Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians, Native Americans and Hispanics last year.
That’s up from $342 billion in 2008. Asians saw the biggest volume, at $136.6 billion, according to HMDA data sorted by this newspaper. They were followed by Hispanics, at $123.8 billion, African Americans, at $90 billion, Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders at $9.3 billion, and Native Americans and Alaska Natives at $9.2 billion.
Asians showed the biggest increase, from $100 billion in 2008 to $130 billion in 2009. African American mortgages decreased, from $96 billion to $90 billion.
Hispanics also saw decreased volume, from $130 billion to $123.8 billion.
Native Hawaiian mortgages were up slightly, to $9.3 billion from $9 billion. Native American mortgage volume increased by about $500 million, to $9.2 billion.
With total HMDA origination of $2.7 trillion, minority lending comes to a total of a little more than 17% of volume, flat to last year.
With the minority population of the United States counted at 33% of the total by the U.S. Census Bureau in 2000, this means that minorities are receiving mortgages at only about half of their representation in the whole.
(HMDA numbers always come in higher than market estimates of volume, perhaps due to double reporting or file errors.)
Though a recovery from 2008, the 2009 minority lending numbers remain well below the market high of 2007, which was $614 billion. Minority percentage of total volume has been shrinking in recent years as well, from 22.6% in 2006.
Two lenders dominated mortgages to minorities last year. Bank of America, aided by its acquisition of Countrywide Financial (Countrywide was the traditional leader in lending to minorities) was first, at $80 billion.
Wells Fargo was second, at $71 billion.
B of A led Wells in all the minority categories except for Asians. Wells made $30.1 billion in loans to Asian borrowers last year, while B of A did $27.7 billion.
B of A was first in lending to Hispanics ($27.6 billion to $21.8 billion), African Americans ($20.3 billion to $15.3 billion), Native Hawaiians ($1.8 billion to $1.6 billion) and Native Americans ($2.4 billion to $1.7 billion).
The big volumes minority populations saw during the mortgage boom had to do with a two-edged sword: after years of being ignored by lenders, they were targeted for mortgages—by subprime lenders.
It may be that the falloff since then represents a return to more normal lending patterns. However, at a 17% share for a population of 33% of all people in the country, that is a pattern that needs to be changed.
