Company: New American Funding
Innovation Title: New American Dream
Company Website: www.newamericanfunding.com
Year Introduced: 2016
Executive Summary
What Makes New American Dream Unique
In 2016, New American Funding formed New American Dream, which seeks to raise awareness and increase homeownership within Black communities by building consumer confidence through home-buying education programs and increasing accessibility to a variety of loan programs. The committee that heads New American Dream helps identify and remove roadblocks that can act as barriers to fulfilling the dream of homeownership.
New American Funding uses manual underwriting to accommodate borrower scenarios for earning, spending, and credit that are common among minority borrowers. This tactic is different from many employed by other sizable lenders that focus on technology to speed up the underwriting process.
New American Dream is led by Director of Legislative Policy & External Affairs Charles Lowery. In his role, Lowery also represents the company in aligning with national organizations to further the company’s mission of increasing minority homeownership.
New American Funding believes in hiring “mirrors,” people who are familiar with cultural differences and equipped to help those in minority communities. As a result of this effort, approximately 46 percent of the company’s workforce is made up of minorities.
The Program’s Purpose and Goal
For far too long the Black community has been left behind, when it comes to buying a home. New American Funding Co-Founder and President Patty Arvielo, a first-generation Hispanic-American, created New American Dream to address these shortcomings. As a mortgage lender, New American Funding is committed to lending $20 billion in new mortgages to Black borrowers by 2028.
Benefits and Positive Changes
Through this program, New American Funding helps thousands of individuals and families in minority communities buy a home. This helps build stable neighborhoods and creates generational wealth and financial security.
Indicators/Metrics
This program delivers results. According to the latest Census data, 12.1 percent of the U.S. population is Black. However, only 6.7 percent of total purchase loans in 2020 went to Black borrowers, per the 2020 HMDA data.
New American Funding exceeds both numbers, as 12.4 percent of the company’s purchase loans in 2020 went to Black borrowers.
Put another way, the company’s percentage of purchase lending to Black borrowers in 2020 was 85 percent more than the industry’s percentage.
How New American Dream Drives Growth
By working carefully and thoughtfully with Black borrowers, New American Funding is enabling the Black community to build wealth, stabilize communities, and create generational opportunities. While other lenders may overlook this important demographic, New American Funding is laser focused on helping those in the Black community buy a home.
Impact
New American Dream directly impacts the Black community, especially those who were previously excluded from lending opportunities in the U.S. for decades due to redlining. New American Funding’s team of more than 4,600 employees works tirelessly to provide homeownership opportunities to the Black community.
