Native American Housing: VA Could Address Some Barriers to Participation in Direct Loan Program

[摘要] A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Several federal programs have been developed to provide homeownership opportunities for Native Americans because private institutions have rarely supplied conventional home loans to Native Americans on trust lands. In 1992, Congress directed the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to create the Native American Veterans Direct Home Loan Program to assist veterans in purchasing, constructing and improving homes. The Native American Veterans Direct Home Loan Program has been characterized by differences in the numbers served, with native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders together receiving almost five times as many as loans as Native Americans. Several factors that apply to Native Americans, but not to native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders, may explain this difference. Long-standing barriers to lending on Native American trust lands include insufficient income and credit history, a lack of meaningful interest in land among many Native Americans, and insufficient infrastructure on trust lands. Other factors that VA can address include program limits that may be lower than housing costs for some trust lands and potential applicants' inexperience with the mortgage lending process. VA has conducted outreach but has taken limited steps to meet the assessment and reporting requirements specified in the program's authorizing legislation. VA attends housing conferences, distributes promotional materials, and responds to inquiries about the program to meet outreach requirements specified in its authorizing legislation."

[发布日期] 2002-08-23 [发布机构] United States. General Accounting Office.

[关键词] Government accountability -- United States.;housing;veterans;native american housing;letter report