Race, Real Estate, and Responsiveness

In this chapter, I empirically trace the state of Black homeownership over the course of the Obama presidency in comparison to other groups. I look at homeownership, foreclosure, and mortgage refinancing rates by race, in addition to residential segregation patterns. I also discuss policies that the Obama administration initiated to help struggling homeowners and reduce residential segregation. Studying homeownership and residential segregation policies in the Obama administration is important because it contributes to the larger debate about what President Obama did for Blacks while in office. We can see if President Obama was quietly advocating for Black interests out of the public eye with programs. This may have been his effort at avoiding what the editors of this volume call the “inclusionary dilemma” of Black politicians attempting to include Black interests within often racially hostile American policy regimes. Now that President Obama’s successor, Donald Trump, has had enough time to put his own stamp on housing policy, we have the advantage of being able to compare the different approaches to and motivations behind particular housing policies. This chapter ends with a brief discussion of how President Obama’s housing policies—the Obama housing legacy—have fared under the Trump administration.