If you spend any amount of time on social media throughout the day, your timeline has most likely been inundated with photos of smiling first-time home buyers, many of whom identify as LGBTQ+. Whether single or partnered, homeownership has become a top priority for African American millennials across the country, and Atlanta is no exception. An increase in sales fueled by the global pandemic has made the once elusive goal of owning a home a reality for many who had previously given up on this aspect of The American Dream.
Hubert Tate, an Atlanta-based gay realtor with Keller Williams Realty, has been navigating the often stressful process with first-time buyers from day one to closing. He has witnessed firsthand the surge in interest by millennials to use the exorbitant amount of money being paid to rent towards a mortgage.
“We have seen a huge increase of individuals who identify as millennials, really driving the marketplace right now, that first-time homeowner thing,” says Tate. “Especially when folks are realizing you can pay two grand for rent, whether it’s in DC, Atlanta, New York, and get a house for maybe the same price or a little cheaper, and now you have locked in that mortgage rate for the next 15, 30 years.”
Tate tells The Reckoning that waiting to invest in real estate should not be an option, especially for African Americans and those who identify as LGBTQ+.
“You buy real estate and wait. You don’t wait to buy real estate,” he says. “A lot of wealth in this country is tied to real estate. The richest people in the world have real estate in their portfolio. Whether they sell it, own it, invest in it, in some way their wealth is tied to real estate. The thing about it is that when you think about real estate, to my understanding, unless God says otherwise, HE is not going to make any more land. And so the land that we have, that's it. If you're sitting on some land, he who owns the land, holds the power,” says Tate.
It’s a message that Daniel Driffin, 35, a public health consultant and one of Tate’s clients received from relatives years before he chose Tate as his realtor and trusted guide through the home-buying process.
Continue reading here.