Hitting the Wall: Credit as an Impediment to Homeownership

BABC 04-5: There is a broad consensus regarding the benefits of homeownership, which include wealth accumulation and improvements along social and personal dimensions. Given the important role that homeownership plays for households and communities, overcoming barriers to homeownership is an important social and public policy goal. This paper focuses on one such barrier – poor credit quality – and analyzes trends in credit quality for the overall population and demographic subgroups in the United States, focusing on estimated credit quality among renters in comparison to owners…