1950s Housing Discrimination Essay

Housing Discrimination in the 1950s

Housing in the 1950s was segregated, primarily based on people’s race. During this time, many white people were wealthy enough to live in the “Type A” areas, which were the suburbs on the outskirts of town. “Type B” areas were considered “still desirable” but not as great as the “Type A” areas. Colored families mainly lived in “Type C”, or “Type D” areas, further away from white neighborhoods. The two areas were labeled as “declining” and “risky”, and were located near the center of cities with very few white families living there. The majority of colored families lived in these types of areas since they were more run down and located in undesirable places. Many colored families made far less money than

When white families lived in those neighborhoods, they had more “value” but when colored families started to come into the areas, white families moved out to “Type A” and “Type B” neighborhoods. White families would move out of these areas because they believed that the colored families would make their neighborhood’s value decrease. They also did this because when the new families moved in, they were not comfortable with living near someone of a different race than them. The whites moving made a huge impact on the way that lower-income neighborhoods lived. They did not have access to the things that “Type A” and “Type B” families had. White families were allowed to have mortgages and insurance for their houses, and could even get help from the FHA if they could not afford their housing mortgage. Colored families did not have this benefit since the FHA had appraisal standards that included a whites-only requirement. They had this in place because racial segregation became a requirement of the mortgage insurance program. The FHA determined that properties that were in or near mixed or black neighborhoods were “high risk”. This meant that those neighborhoods were not allowed insurance and housing mortgages, or any help from the FHA, so if anything were to happen to their house the FHA would have nothing to do about

They also had to deal with the constant white families moving out because they thought living in a mixed community would decrease the value of their house and neighborhood. Colored families also had to live with far less money than white families which meant that they could not afford many things that they needed. Things like being able to be safe from gangs in a neighborhood, being able to afford food for their whole family, and living in a house that's functional for the entire family were not available to these people. On top of this, many colored people lived in a house with their entire extended family, which made it much more challenging to support that household. The FHA’s requirements of whites-only made many colored families scared for anything to happen to their house because without help or insurance, something could happen to their house and then they wouldn't have anywhere to