The Real Deal

Promoters of home ownership get awards

By Jean Newton

At the first Home Ownership Participation for Everyone, or HOPE, Awards ceremony held recently in Washington, D.C., six organizations and one individual were honored for their innovative work in promoting homeownership programs and helping more than 150,000 minorities become homeowners.

Keynote speaker, former Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Jack Kemp, extolled the economic and social benefits of homeownership and praised the HOPE partnership for its efforts to improve minority homeownership at an awards luncheon at the National Press Club.

Kemp, who spoke at length about how perspectives change with homeownership, said, "You don't need to tell people to improve that which they own. As soon as they own something, improvement begins to take place not only in the physical asset of a piece of property and the home, but also in the mental attitude of the family that gets the ownership."

Jeff Barnett, vice president of Alain Pinel Realtors of Los Gatos, attended the event, representing the Silicon Valley Association of Realtors. "The dream of homeownership should be within reach of every American. These awards are a way to highlight achievement and encourage Realtor involvement in minority homeownership," said Barnett.

The HOPE awards were developed to recognize outstanding contributions by individuals and organizations to promote homeownership by minorities. HOPE award categories include homeownership education, real estate brokerage, finance, project of the year, public policy, media coverage and leadership. Winners were selected from nearly 200 nominations on the basis of impact, innovation, minority focus and contribution to affordable housing minority acceptance. The recipients were determined by panel of expert judges, including Henry Cisneros, former secretary of Housing and Urban Development; Reps. John L. Lewis and Maxine Waters; Nicolas P. Retsinas, director of the Joint Center for Housing Studies of Harvard University; and F. Barton Harvey III, chairman and CEO of the Enterprise Foundation.

The following winners received a $10,000 honorarium: California Capital Companies, Ontario, Calif., for meeting the needs of first-time Hispanic homebuyers; Home Loan Counseling Center-Sacramento, for closing the gap in homeownership rates across race and economic boundaries; Self Help Credit Union, Durham, N.C., for expanding home ownership among people traditionally under served by the banking system; Northeast Florida Builders Association, Jacksonville, Fla., for forming a partnership with Habitat for Humanity and building 101 homes in 17 days; Greater Baltimore Board of Realtors, Lutherville, Md., for educating African American women about barriers to legitimate homeownership; Vincent Quayle, St. Ambrose Center, Baltimore, Md., for helping to change the attitudes of Baltimore's local lending community toward African American buyers; ARK Communication, Millbrae, for establishing the first Chinese-English real estate website at bayhouseinfo.com.

The HOPE awards are sponsored by a partnership of six real estate associations, including: California Association of Real Estate Brokers, the Chinese American Real Estate Professionals Association of Southern California, the Chinese Real Estate Association of America, the Korean Real Estate Brokers of Southern California, the National Association of Hispanic Real Estate Professionals, the National Association of Real Estate Brokers and the National Association of Realtors. Co-sponsoring organizations are Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, the National Association of Home Builders, REALTOR.com, Century-21, Coldwell Banker and ERA Real Estate.

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Information provided in this column is presented by the Realtor members of the Silicon Valley Association of Realtors at www.siliconvalley-realtors.org. Send questions on any topic to jnewton@jnpr.com.

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