New American Funding addresses the challenges Latinos face with homeownership

During Hispanic Heritage Month, Hispanic Lifestyle is profiling businesses, organizations and individuals who have inspiring stories when reaching out to the Latino Community. Here, Hispanic Lifestyle is highlighting New American Funding for their focus on helping Latinos achieve the dream of homeownership.

New American Funding’s Founder and President, Patricia Arvielo  organized the Latino Focus Committee. The mission is to identify and address challenges Hispanic consumers face in their pursuit of homeownership. The Latino Focus Committee seeks to enhance the quality of Latinos’ experience with attaining a home loan, and enriching the Hispanic community through homeownership.

The Latino Focus Committee directly confronts these challenges with a variety of initiatives. They have developed several core outreach elements, including Spanish-language educational materials, and Spanish-language radio and billboard campaigns.  The group has prioritized outreach that is specifically designed to educate the Hispanic community about their homeownership opportunities. For example, New American Funding’s Smart Start Home Buyer program, an initiative designed to educate first time homebuyers about the process of purchasing a home, includes Spanish-language educational materials. On the operations side, the mortgage banker uses manual underwriting to accommodate cultural differences in earning, spending, and credit that are common among Latinos.