DENVER – April 13, 2015 – (RealEstateRama) — The number of Native American homeowners continues to rise in the Rocky Mountain Region as a result of The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s (HUD) guaranteed loan program. HUD’s Section 184 Indian Home Loan Guarantee program addresses the lack of mortgage lending for Native Americans and gives their families the opportunity to purchase their own homes. Homeownership in the Indian country in the Colorado, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Utah and Wyoming rose more than 220% from 2005-2014, according to numbers released by HUD’s Denver Regional Office.
“When Native American communities in our region thrive, our nation thrives,” said HUD’s Rocky Mountain Regional Administrator Rick Garcia. “Purchasing a home is the primary way to build wealth and now Native Americans have the same opportunity by buying a home of their own.”
The Office of Loan Guarantee within HUD’s Office of Native American Programs, guarantees the Section 184 home mortgage loans made to Native Borrowers. In Colorado alone, more than 76 million dollars in mortgage financing has been guaranteed by the department since 2010.
Loans are used to purchase, construct, rehabilitate, refinance, or purchase and rehabilitate a home located on a reservation or within an Indian area. A one-time guarantee fee is charged; it can be financed, or paid in cash at closing. The maximum mortgage term is 30 years.
Based on the unique status of Indian lands being held in Trust, Native American homeownership has historically been an underserved market. The tribal trust and allotted numbers are opportunities created for natives where little or no other financing was previously available to purchase a home on trust land. Working with an expanding network of private sector and tribal partners, the Section 184 Program increases access to capital for Native Americans and provide private funding opportunities for tribal housing agencies. In Montana, over 300 families were able to secure mortgage financing on trust land that otherwise was nearly impossible to obtain.
Since 2002, the program has become very popular in Native communities, a trend that can be traced to HUD’s shift from a broad-based national outreach campaign to a more localized grassroots marketing approach.
As of 2014, the Section 184 program has guaranteed over 24,000 loans (almost $4 billion dollars in guaranteed funds) to individuals, Tribes, and Tribally Designated Housing Entity’s. Since the program’s inception in 1995, through December 2014, 27,447 loans had been guaranteed, for more than $4.4 billion. Additionally, the program guaranteed more than 3,400 loans for Native American families, totaling more than $595 million in 2014.
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