Dallas is set to join Detroit, the San Francisco Bay area and the DMV (D.C., Maryland, Virginia) in Capital Impact Partners’ Equitable Development Initiative, a program intended to help minority developers.
The Congressionally chartered nonprofit said Thursday it would open the program to approximately 20 emerging real estate developers of color in the Dallas area to help them “pursue affordable housing projects and play a larger role in shaping Dallas’ development landscape.”
“Communities of color in Dallas are suffering, pushed farther out of the city due to rapidly rising home costs, a lack of housing inventory, and gentrification,” the nonprofit said in a statement that highlighted the city’s soaring home prices and affordable housing shortage.
The Washington-based financial institution launched its Equitable Development Initiative in 2018 and has since trained almost 200 developers of color. The program offers business funding and network building for participants as well as training in real estate finance, project and contractor management, legal services and community engagement.
“As we are doing in Detroit, the Washington metro area, and the San Francisco Bay Area, our EDI program will begin to build a more equitable real estate development ecosystem here in Dallas,” said Ellis Carr, president and CEO of Capital Impact Partners and CDC Small Business Finance.
The program’s expansion into North Texas is getting help from JPMorgan Chase & Co and Charles Schwab. JPMorgan Chase is providing $500,000 in grant funding and Charles Schwab Bank is providing its lending support for an undisclosed amount.
In 2020, JPMorgan Chase committed $30 million toward fighting racial injustice – less than three years after issuing $55 million to settle allegations of discriminating against minority borrowers.
Mortgage applications submitted by Black and Latino Texans were disproportionately rejected compared to their white counterparts in 2020, according to Home Mortgage Disclosure Act data analyzed by Zillow. The report also revealed that 18.7 percent of Black mortgage applicants in Texas were denied in 2020, compared to 11.2 percent of white applicants.
Dallas’ lack of diversity in the real estate industry affects “both developers of color as well as communities of color,” said Capital Impact. “Developers of color face significant barriers to entering the real estate space due to the lack of access to capital, equity and experience – the result of generations of structural racism and disinvestment.”