GOOD NEW$ FOR MINORITY DWELLERS

NEW ORLEANS - The National Association of Real Estate Brokers, Inc. (NAREB) will announce a historic engagement between the National Association of Real Estate Brokers and Wall Street investors, to launch an $800 Million Homeownerfs Assurance Program (HAP) to address the devastating effects of the mortgage crisis on minority families and their communities.

The announcement will be made Sunday, following the first NAREB State of Housing in Black America Issues Forum in New Orleans.

The Forum is one of several events taking place during NAREBfs 64th Annual Conference at the Ritz Carlton Hotel in New Orleans.

Through the innovative program, NAREB's partners will provide an infrastructure to acquire, manage, market and dispose of non-performing loans and REOs (properties held by banks), GSEs, security firms, governmental agencies and other entities in urban and rural communities across America.

The Wall Street investors have committed to providing the initial capital for the purchase of non-performing loans and REO assets up to $200 million per quarter beginning in third quarter 2011 to launch the program.

According to the NAREB Public Policy Paper, African American and other ethnic minorities, and the communities in which they live have borne a disproportionate share of the damage from foreclosed real estate left in the wake of the countryfs severe housing and economic crisis.

Unfortunately, the families that are holding on to any last minute solution or those that have survived the foreclosure crisis and are maintaining a home, have not received the attention required to protect them from lenders who have written down the debt and are pressing for foreclosures and follow up evictions.

The evictions in return create and expand a new community crisis. vacant and abandoned properties.

This wholesale eviction of families, and dumping of foreclosed or abandoned properties in minority communities without a sustainable solution, is causing a new crisis of undervalued and/or vacant and blighted property.

Therefore, says NAREB President-Elect, Julius Cartwright, "An innovative housing assistance program and strategy is needed. Many of the current programs are ineffective - not adequately addressing all of the needs in our nationfs communities, particularly minority communities.. Prior to the start of the State of Housing in Black America Issues Forum, NAREB members will go on an escorted bus tour to New Orleansf Lower 9th Ward, Pontchartrain Park and Gentilly Woods, where they will be able to see, first hand, the true impact of the housing crisis in the communities that were stricken by a disaster not seen of this scale in the country and the impact of foreclosure and blight due to both events in some of the historical minority communities."

"NAREB," says Cartwright, "has developed a program that is focused on foreclosure mitigation and also deals with disaster recovery as well as the resulting blight caused by both crises hitting concurrently which is what you find in New Orleans. Ultimately, our program is designed to protect the legacy, preserve the history, and restore hope to minority communities all over the country."

The Issues Forum will feature a panel discussion with a variety of industry professionals and experts discussing the three key issues relating to the mortgage crisis (foreclosure mitigation, disaster recovery and neighborhood blight).

Panel participants include: Julius Cartwright (NAREB, President-Elect); Lawrence Batiste (NAREB, Chairman of the Board); Paul R. Taylor, Jr. (SRP Development Management, Managing Member); Cicero Wilson (SRP Development Management, Vice President and Grants Administrator); Maurice Jourdain-Earl (Compliance Tech, Managing Director); Dr. LaVaughn M. Henry (Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, Vice President and Senior Regional Officer); Lindsay Jonker (The Salvation Army EnviRenew, Greater New Orleans, Executive Director); and Dr. Benjamin Chavis (Hip-Hop Summit Action Network (HSAN), Co-Founder, President & CEO and Education Online Services Corporation (EOServe Corp), President).

New Orleans is just one of several cities that will host the State of Housing in Black America Issues Forum over the next year and a half. Other participating cities include: Atlanta, Washington D.C., and Cleveland with a final report of findings presented to members of congress in Washington D.C., in partnership with the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies.