ROANOKE TIMES 

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, June 22, 1993                   TAG: 9306220112
SECTION: BUSINESS                    PAGE: B7   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Short

WHITES MORE LIKELY TO OWN THEIR HOMES, FEDERAL REPORT SHOWS

Whites are more likely to own their homes, while blacks and Hispanics are more likely to rent, federal officials said Monday. Some experts said it underscored the disparity in incomes among racial groups.

Figures released by the Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development showed that 68 percent of white heads of household own their homes, compared with 43 percent of blacks and 39 percent of Hispanics.

"The biggest reason is money," said Langston Chick, a black real estate agent in Silver Spring, Md. "A lot of times we are on the edge. We just don't have the basic 5 percent [down payment] to buy a house."

Home owners had a median annual income of $34,800, nearly twice that of renters, $18,700, even though they spent about the same amount of money for housing - $455 per month for owners and $462 per month for renters.

Timothy Grall, author of the report, pointed to large differences in the amounts of money earned by various racial or ethnic groups.

According to census figures, the median income of black households was $18,807 in 1991, compared with $31,569 for white households. The median income for people of Hispanic origin, who can be of any race, was $22,691.

There are 59.8 million home-owning households in the United States in 1991, including those with one or more mortgages and those with none. Nearly 90 percent of all home owners were white, while 8 percent were black.

Among the nation's 33.4 million renters, 76 percent were white, 19 percent were black and 5 percent were of other groups. But, 57 percent of black households and 61 percent of Hispanic households were renters, compared to 18 percent of white households. 


 by CNB