Abstract
Wealth inequality in the United States continues to widen year after year. However, only recently has research addressed the relationship of race and wealth and few have analyzed specific forms of wealth accumulation. Home equity is the most popular and significant method of wealth accumulation, yet much about multiethnic equity accumulation is unknown. Without research that explicitly identifies the most important forms and causes of racial differences in homeownership and home equity, public policy is less able to take appropriate and informed action against the most significant barriers to equality. This study attempts to fill the gap in information and analyzes the role of racial stratification within neighborhoods on the odds of homeownership and its effect on home equity accumulation within the pan-ethnic racial groups. This study uses hierarchical linear modeling and data from the American Housing Survey National sample from 2005. Even while controlling for various factors in the home equity accumulation process, this study finds discriminatory residential patterns are constraining the market process and reducing the value appreciation of homes owned by Hispanic and Black households. More specifically, a neighborhood level barrier exists that is actively suppressing their wealth. Houses of Black and Hispanic homeowners in segregated neighborhoods produce less wealth than houses in integrated neighborhoods. Not only is the disparate access to equal housing contributing to the perpetuation of the racial wealth divide in the United States. It is contributing to political and social inequalities directly linked to wealth.