Exploring Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Mortgage Access Across Metro Atlanta

This brief analyzes the mortgage lending activity in the five-county Atlanta metro region (Clayton, Cobb, DeKalb, Fulton, and Gwinnett counties). Building from our recent report “What’s Driving Post-Pandemic Black-White Mortgage Access Gaps? A Spotlight on 10 Southeastern Cities,” this report analyses 2022-2023 Home Mortgage Disclosure Act (HMDA) data to identify whether these patterns of mortgage access disparity are similar across counties and sub-county areas within the metro, and which patterns are evident for other racial and ethnic groups.

Our work analyzed access trends and gaps across White, Black, Hispanic, and Asian homebuyers throughout the five core Atlanta metro counties. For each racial or ethnic group, we estimated how much more or less likely these borrowers were to have their mortgage applications denied than White borrowers with similar financial characteristics.

Our findings show that across the region, mortgage applicants of color are more likely to be denied conventional loans than White applicants with similar financial qualifications. While lower incomes, higher debt-to-income ratios, and loan-to-value ratios above 90% were significant drivers of denial rates across the region, denial rates for Black, Hispanic, and Asian borrowers remained higher than White denial rates even among well-qualified applicants. We additionally observe that Black borrowers experience the highest disparities in access to mortgage credit in submarkets with the largest concentrations of Black population, while Asian borrowers experience the highest disparities in submarkets with the smallest Asian populations. These findings emphasize the need for robust enforcement of laws including the Equal Credit Opportunity Act and the Fair Housing Act.