A new report on race and home buying by the National Association of Realtors shows that while the housing market remained strong, gaps in homeownership continued to widen during the pandemic, write Michaelle Bond and Dominique DeMoe for The Philadelphia Inquirer.

However the situation has been worsening for much longer, as Black Americans saw the largest drop in homeownership rates over the last decade.

The report also shows that financial institutions are two-and-a-half times more likely to reject mortgage applications from Black prospective home buyers than those of white buyers. Additionally, Black home buyers are more likely to have student loan debt, which can also be a hurdle in purchasing a home.

In Pennsylvania, the homeownership rate is 73 percent. However, while the white ownership rate is at 76 percent, for Black homeowners that rate is drastically lower at 11 percent.

With prices rising, fewer households can afford to buy a home, with under half of the Black households fitting that category in Pennsylvania.

“We need to find solutions for everyone to have the same opportunities for homeownership,” said Nadia Evangelou, senior economist and director of forecasting at the National Association of Realtors.

Read more about homeownership at The Philadelphia Inquirer by clicking here.