Martinez Family Buys First Home with Assist from PrivateMI, Bank and Nonprofit
Finally, that day came last summer when the Martinez family bought a home with the help of Avenue Community Development Corporation (Avenue CDC), Southwest Bank of Texas and PMI Mortgage Insurance Co., a private mortgage insurance (PrivateMI) company.
PMI Mortgage Insurance Co. established a $125,000 revolving fund to help Avenue CDC, a nonprofit community development group, buy and rehabilitate homes in underserved neighborhoods in Houston. The Southwest Bank of Texas, which contributed $25,000, operates the fund.
Avenue CDC uses money in the fund for its Move Home Program, which helps people like the Martinezes become homeowners. Move Home has already renovated 22 homes that had been slated for demolition. Instead of being torn down, the structures were donated, rehabilitated, and moved to new locations for sale to low-income families.
Mrs. Martinez, her husband and their children are all overjoyed: “It is our dream come true. We have a beautiful home and yard in a safe, quiet, clean place for our children,” said Mrs. Martinez. “We could not have done it without Avenue CDC and the help they gave us throughout the home buying process.”
“PMI is in the homeownership business,” said W. Roger Haughton, Chairman and CEO of the San Francisco-based company. “Expanding homeownership opportunities for everyone capable of owning a home is what our business is all about. We are very pleased to be working with two such fine partners as Avenue CDC and Southwest Bank of Texas to acquire and rehabilitate affordable homes in the City of Houston that will be sold to neighborhood families. Homeownership strengthens families, and stronger families build stronger communities.”
Mrs. Martinez learned about the Avenue CDC program at a home-buying seminar at her children’s elementary school. Although interested in the home purchase program, she was hesitant to sign up. Finally, a friend convinced Mrs. Martinez to discuss her situation with Maria Guzman- Pineda of Avenue CDC, the program counselor who had conducted the seminar at the school. Guzman-Pineda quickly set up the pre-qualification process with the family.
Meanwhile, Avenue CDC worked with the Martinez family to help them correct some credit blemishes so they could qualify to buy a home. They never had bad credit, but Mrs. Martinez’s habit of signing up for credit cards to get free prizes had a negative effect on her credit report. With assistance from Avenue CDC, she wrote letters to the credit bureaus explaining why she had so many credit cards and that her teenage son was paying off his own student loans. Seven months later, when an Avenue CDC house was available, the Martinez family became proud owners.
Now that they have their own place, Mrs. Martinez finds that the family is together much more often.
“Our house is so nice that my family is here with us much more often than they were before, and my younger children don’t go out as much as they used to,” she observed. “My relatives even came from Mexico to spend Thanksgiving and Christmas with us this year because the house is so comfortable; when we were renting, we would all go back to Mexico for the holidays.”
Mrs. Martinez relishes the spaciousness of her new home, and that she can decorate as she wishes.
“I love that I can fix up the house however I want – plant a tree or a garden, add a closet or build a bedroom,” she said. “And my children feel more secure and confident.”