A number of prominent individuals and organizations will join Sec Fudge during this event. Following the opening remarks, the Secretary will be joined by several mayors of urban areas where disparities exist in home ownership. The mayors will both promote home ownership by young adults and speak on their own efforts to facilitate young people purchasing homes in their respective cities. Additionally, a variety of organizations representing diverse communities across the US will also be supporting the event. The session will also feature young homeowners representing communities of color and sharing their experiences with home purchasing, as well as a Q & A session to highlight resources offered by HUD and its Federal Housing Authorities.

The outreach by Secretary Fudge and HUD is intended to address important gaps in home ownership. Those disparities includes an age gap: the World Economic Forum reports that 70% of Americans who were born in the 1940s owned a home by age 35, the corresponding number for Millennials born in the 1980s is only 50%. The racial gap in home ownership is even more stark. According to the National Association of Realtors, 82% of all home purchases in 2021 were conducted by white buyers, while only 8% of homes were sold to Black purchasers. Black potential home buyers are also twice as likely as white applicants to be denied mortgages.

Since taking office, President Joe Biden has made affordable housing a priority of his administration. The White House has emphasized several housing policies intended to make both renting and home ownership more affordable. This emphasis comes in the midst of a growing housing crisis across the the US. “Our country’s facing a historic low supply of entry-level homes for sale,” Habitat for Humanity executive Chris Vincent told ABC News earlier this year. With rising housing costs hitting millennials and Black Americans especially hard, the administration has particularly focused on closing these gaps. Secretary Fudge has specifically sought to close the racial wealth gap between white families and Black and Latino families, a gap that is largely reflective of disparities in home ownership that have grown over the last 50 years.

The HUD House Party will be a key opportunity for the department to highlight its policies and make young and minority families aware of the resources and opportunities available to them as they seek to purchase homes. The event will begin at 6:30pm EST on November 1. The event will be live-streamed via Youtube, Facebook and Twitter.