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Home Ownership Rate for Black Portlanders and Black Oregonians Has Plummeted

Housing blogger Tom Cusack pulled census data for past four decades. "The picture that emerges is depressing."

(Joe Riedl)
By Nigel Jaquiss

Tom Cusack, who writes the Oregon Housing blog, took a look at the rates of home ownership for black Oregonians and Portlanders this week.

Cusack, a Lake Oswego resident who formerly worked for the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development, crunched census data going back to 1970.

"In 1970 the statewide Oregon black home ownership rate was 44.7%; In 2017 it was 32.2%, a decline of 28% (12.5 'points')," Cusack writes. "In 1970 the black home ownership rate in the City of Portland was 46.9%; In 2017 the City of Portland rate was 28.4% That's a decline of 39.5% (18.5 'points')."

Here's Cusack's chart:

Home ownership for Asian and white Portlanders is considerably higher, although also under pressure, according to recently city of Portland Housing Bureau figures.

Meanwhile, home ownership statewide in Oregon is about 62 percent, according to Census data.

Cusack wrote that a recent story in The Oregonian inspired him to dig further.

"The picture that emerges," he writes. "Is depressing."

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