Earlier this week, the Center joined the National Fair Housing Alliance (NFHA), 18 other fair housing organizations, and two Maryland homeowners in filing a lawsuit against Bank of America and Safeguard Properties Management alleging violations of the Fair Housing Act. The lawsuit accuses Bank of America and Safeguard Properties of failing to maintain bank-owned properties in communities of color to the same level as their properties in white areas, amounting to discriminatory treatment that is illegal under federal fair housing law.

For example, 45% of BOA-owned properties in communities of color had major maintenance problems – such as unkempt lawns, pests and rodents, boarded-up windows, and trash in the yard – compared with just 11% of the bank’s properties in white neighborhoods.  Their neglect affects property values, health & safety in these communities.

The lawsuit is the result of a multi-year investigation by NFHA and fair housing agencies across the country, including the Center. Together, we investigated more than 1,600 Bank of America-owned homes in working- and middle-class white, African-American, and Latino neighborhoods in 37 metropolitan areas nationwide, including in Connecticut.

Lisa Rice, the CEO of the National Fair Housing Alliance, said, “Bank of America and Safeguard’s intentional failure to correct their discriminatory treatment in African American and Latino neighborhoods—the same communities hardest hit by the foreclosure crisis—is systemic racism. The purposeful neglect of bank-owned homes in communities of color devalues the properties and the lives of the families in the neighborhoods around them. The health and safety hazards created by these blighted bank-owned homes negatively affect the residents, especially the children, living nearby. We have asked Bank of America and Safeguard to provide the same standard of routine exterior maintenance and marketing for all of its bank-owned homes, regardless of the age, value, or racial composition of the neighborhood in which they are located.”

Other key findings from the investigation:

• 64% of Bank of America properties in communities of color had trash or debris visible on the property, while only 31% of the bank’s properties in predominantly white neighborhoods had trash visible on the property.
• 37% of Bank of America properties in communities of color had unsecured or broken doors, while only 16% of their properties in predominantly white neighborhoods had unsecured or broken doors.

Read the full details and view more photos from the investigation in NFHA’s press release. 

Read the Washington Post’s recent coverage of this case.

 

This post summarized and paraphrased a press release from the National Fair Housing Alliance.