Where the Monies Reside (Find Down Payment & Closing Costs Assistance in ANY State)

What’s What?

This post is to bring awareness of the housing assistance available through various (from first time home buying and programs and services in pretty much every state and non-state in the U.S. For me, this post is personal. I randomly found out about (story time for another time), took advantage of and qualified for various housing assistance programs that were for DC residents to be able to buy my first property for less than what it was worth. I didn’t even know fully what equity was when I first purchased my home, yet I had it instantly, all because of those programs. Owning a home isn’t easy but neither is anything else worth having or working for. Thankfully, it’s been doable and super rewarding AKA one of the best decisions of my life.

How to Get Down Payment + Closing Costs Assistance

DPA is down payment assistance. Down payment assistance is offered through programs geared towards first time home buyers, however, after 3 years (for most programs), you are considered a first time home buyer. Each state (and non-states) has an HFA, or a Housing Finance Agency and their goal among other things is to provide financing to households who qualify in order to purchase, develop, and rehabilitate homes and rental apartments.

Find an HFA

HUD and NCSHA were huge resources for locating where the monies reside in every state and territory in America.

HUD is a federal agency that most of us know about and it stands for U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. NCSHA, or the National Council of State Housing Agencies, is a non-profit organization and over on their site, they say they were “created to advance, through advocacy and education, the efforts of the nation’s state HFAs and their partners to provide affordable housing to those who need it”. From their website, I was able to find where the HFAs were in each state.

Over on HUD’s website, this page lists all the states (I don’t need to keep saying non-states do I?) that, in their own words, are where you can find: “programs sponsored by your state or local government or other organizations that can help you.” And these home buying programs are in addition to the homeownership and first time home buying assistance programs offered by the FHA.

FHA

FHA stands for the Federal Housing Assistance and as part of HUD, what they’re designed to do is to literally help people become homeowners. What they do is insure your loan so that your lender will allow: relaxed credit qualifications, low down payments, and low closing costs. They state on their website that they’re the world’s largest mortgage insurer. They have special programs like Good Neighbor Next Door for teachers (pre-Kindergarten through 12th grade), law enforcement officers, firefighters and emergency medical technicians, and the Section 203(K) for those who choose to buy fixer uppers and need to make their homes move-in ready.

FHA has other various home buying programs and services, click here to learn more about what FHA has to offer. To learn what other home buying programs and assistance HUD offers, click here. To learn how HUD helps public housing residents become homeowners, click here.

Why Black Homeownership Matters

“Homeownership has been the most effective way that Americans build wealth, which can be passed down from generation to generation,” states the California’s Housing Finance Agency’s (CalHFA) website. Black homeownership is so critical that CalHFA has made ‘Building Black Wealth’ an actual campaign. The primary goal of the campaign is to increase Black homeownership in California. They explain on their website, “looking at homeownership through a lens of equity, Black homeownership is far behind. Our campaign provides educational materials, and connections to resources such as free housing counseling and down payment assistance to help close that gap.” Here’s the link to their YouTube channel for Black homeownership tips and more about their Black Homeownership Initiative.

City and States Near and Dear

Listed below are some of the city and states that are near and dear to my heart and for whatever reason, I felt like doing additional research on the house buying programs available.

DC

DC Housing Finance Agency

Click here to learn about their available programs and here to learn more about DCHFA.

DC Department of Housing and Community Development (DHCD)

For their available programs, click here.

DC’s HFA, DHCD, and Housing Authority all stamp this dchousingsearch.org site for free a affordable housing listing and search engine, “where you can find everything from accessible homes to affordable rental and for-sale homes. Users can also find helpful resources such as renter’s rights information, assistance programs, and an affordability calculator.”

DCHFA helps homeowners as well. Click here to learn more.

Click here for utilities assistance in DC.

For DC Resident Housing Resources, visit Housing DC.

MD

Click here to learn about the statewide Maryland Mortgage Program available to help Maryland residents become homeowners. For Montgomery County’s available home buying programs, click here and here for PG County.

MI

Click here to learn more about what programs for both homeowners and homebuyers the Michigan State Housing Development Authority (MSHDA) offers to Michigan residents.

For information on homeowner and home buying programs through the Detroit Housing Commission, click here. Wayne County receives annual allocation for housing from HUD, click here to see what programs they’re offering. The city of Detroit has a Good Neighborhood Initiative program affiliated with NACA, click here to learn more.

Atlanta

Georgia has nice programs like the Georgia Dream Homeownership Program and Atlanta does too like Invest Atlanta and the Atlanta Housing Homeownership Program.

Miami

Miami/Florida seems to be the same as Georgia with programs through HUD, Florida Housing, Miami Dade County, and Miami HFA .

CA

The number of home buying programs and services that Cali offers is almost enough for me to move there; click here for a list of all their mortgage loan programs. For information about California’s Black Homeownership Initiative, read here.

VA

I do not use the term DMV but I do not judge those who do (anymore). The DMV is and has always been the Department of Motor Vehicles to a born and raised DC resident like myself. Back on topic, Virginia has statewide home buying programs through Virginia Housing. Arlington County has programs and services for both homeowners and first time homebuyers and you can learn more on this site. The city of Alexandria has a page of resources for their residents.

NC

To explore what the NC HFA has to offer, start here. There’s also the NC Community Home Buying Programs. Click here to learn more.

Greensboro

Greensboro, NC is near and dear to my heart because I spent my undergraduate college years there and I’m a very proud Spaggie (UNCG alumna & A&T lover). Anywho, the city of Greensboro offers homebuying assistance and to learn more, start here.

What’s Luxe

Affordable housing is now a crisis in the U.S. but hopefully some relief can be found through some of the above federal, state, and city programs. Apply for every program that you come across, especially as residents and tax-paying citizens, because most programs are stackable and can be used with each other. It is not, at all, an exhaustive list so please reach out if there are more, I would love to add it to this post to make it an ultimate resource to finding down payment and closing costs assistance across the U.S.

Have you used any federal, city or state programs to purchase your first or second property? I would love to know which ones and where you bought in the comments below. I personally took advantage of the DC DHCD and FHA home buying programs. What I love most about the programs mentioned is that some of them allow you to use either types of financing: FHA and conventional. However, be sure to read the requirements on all programs thoroughly for eligibility.

Also, BEWARE of fraudulent sites for home buying programs, lending, credit, etc. Most, if not all, government and non-profit websites end in .gov or .org. Do not apply directly on any website without first calling (or at the very least emailing) to confirm and even doing a drive by of the place of business, if possible. Almost all legit federal, state, and city government and non-profit agencies and program will look, feel and sound legit with a secure website and providing complete contact information (number, address, email, fax, social media). Also, please do not wait on or rely on your realtor or broker to do this research for you. It would be awesome if they were already knowledgeable and they should definitely be supportive, however, the due diligence falls on the person who is making a huge financial purchase. Finally, if it sounds too good to be true, it most likely is.

And I cannot forget to shoutout to Relly B., the originator of the saying “Where The Money Reside”! Watch the YouTube video (not his) of his viral social media post here and visit/follow his IG page.