Four reasons why Americans' ‘financial capability’ is so low

By Pam Bailey, NeighborWorks America blogger
With the insecurities of the Great Recession still fresh, and continuing to bite for others, the need for each of us to be savvy managers of our personal finances is obvious. Yet, 11 years after the U.S. Congress first declared April Financial Literacy Month (changing to “Financial Capability Month” in 2012), it’s clear that too many Americans -- whether college-educated or not -- lack the knowledge, skills and attitude needed to get the most value they can from whatever financial resources they have.

NeighborWorks America commissioned a survey this spring that documented the size of the problem: Chief among the findings is the alarming fact that approximately 70 million (29 percent) of adult Americans have no emergency savings in place, and another 53 million (21 percent) have only enough money saved to get by for a month or less. Those findings are not surprising in light the results of another survey, conducted by the National Foundation of Credit Counseling, showing that 61 percent of U.S. adults -- the highest percentage in six years -- admit to not keeping a budget.

Clearly, all of the education and resources offered by a myriad of organizations and businesses have yet to reach large numbers of people -- or result in the holy grail, behavior change. So, what’s holding back our progress? I asked a few experts, both in the classroom and in the trenches, and here are four dynamics they say must be overcome through innovative outreach, education and programming:

1) Misconceptions about who can benefit 

The NeighborWorks America survey found that more than half of families earning less than $40,000 (52 percent) have no emergency savings. Yes, it’s a no-brainer conclusion. But the problem is bigger than their low incomes. Too many people – including funders, practitioners and potential beneficiaries -- believe that those with low incomes and few assets cannot be helped with financial education, counseling or coaching.

“The perception that low-income people can’t save has persisted for years, ever since IDAs (individual development accounts) were first created in the 1990s,” observes Christi Baker, director of asset-building programs for the Mission Economic Development Agency (MEDA) and a faculty member for NeighborWorks America’s training program for financial-capability counselors and coaches. “But that is simply not true. With the right incentives, education and support, anyone with aspirations, no matter how meager their assets, can improve their personal finances.”

Sheri Powers, director of  The Unity Council’s Homeownership Center in Oakland, CA, adds that individuals with low incomes often think they have less money than they actually do. “We have our clients track every single expense for three months,” she explains. “Then we go through the data with them. They typically have no idea they were spending so much money on things like dining out and movies. But numbers don’t lie, and they discover that they actually aren’t too broke to save.”

MEDA and The Unity Council were among the 30 organizations that participated in a financial-capability demonstration project completed last year through a partnership between NeighborWorks America and the Citi Foundation. The project was designed to identify how to establish and sustain programs that result in positive behavior change, and the results were summarized in a report that offers specific suggestions for organizations looking to enter the field or improve their offerings.

2) Conflicting social signals

Powers adds that Americans live in a culture that stresses “living in the now,” with few immediate rewards for saving. As a result, budgeting is not a skill that is widely taught. “One of our instructors says that in China, people plan for 100 years, into their grandchildren’s generation. But in the United States, there are not a lot of messages in pop culture about the sexiness of saving,” she observes.

As a result, people resist thinking ahead to retirement or an unanticipated emergency.  One of her tactics, Powers says, is to pose direct questions that confront clients with choices and their consequences – in terms that relate to their personal priorities. In the NeighborWorks America survey, “saving for retirement” was the most commonly cited financial goal.

“Chances are good today that you’ll live to be 90 years old,” Powers says, citing a common conversation she has with clients. “Let’s say you retire at 70. That means you’ll need to support yourself for 20 years. How do you want to spend your last 20 years on earth?”

3) Resistance to asking for help

Both the National Foundation for Credit Counseling survey and a poll commissioned by NeighborWorks America last fall, focusing on how adults educate themselves before buying a home, found that rather than seeking financial help from professionals, many people simply consult with family and friends or the Internet.

“People often think they can handle it themselves,” observes Powers.  “They may also not want to admit to personal struggles or to share such intimate information with ‘outsiders.’ But we’ll challenge them and ask, ‘So, how’s that worked for you?’”

Women and single parents often feel selfish if they set personal financial goals, adds Powers. Her team reminds them of the instructions they hear on an airplane: “In case of an emergency, secure your own oxygen mask first, then assist the person next to you – in other words, your children. How can you help them if you don’t take care of yourself?”

The surveys also showed a lack of awareness that many nonprofit organizations offer this kind of assistance at an affordable rate, as well as reluctance to use them once they are aware.

“A couple of years ago,” says Baker, “a group in New York surveyed both clients and potential clients, and it was clear there is a stigma about going to nonprofits. They either didn’t identify as a ‘poor person’ who needed a ‘charity program,’ or didn’t think that nonprofits could employ really expert professionals. We need to dispel those myths. The reality is that nonprofits offer financial-management assistance to people in many income brackets. And the training they receive from NeighborWorks America is highly focused on demonstrating positive outcomes.”  

4) Predatory business practices

Of course, the problems cannot all be laid at the door of un-informed or time-starved individuals with conflicting priorities. As was evident in the recent housing crisis, there are plenty of examples of predatory business practices that prey on consumer weaknesses.

For example, Alex Anderson, one of the financial coaches who serve The Unity Council clients, worked with one “un-banked” client whose records showed a plethora of $8 fees. It turned out the client was using a debit card issued by a discount-store chain, and every time she tried to withdraw more money than she had available, she was charged the fee instead of just being notified of insufficient funds.

“The fees added up and eroded her disposable income by four percent,” recalls Anderson. “There’s a huge industry out there that takes advantage of these folks.”

Next post: The missing piece of the puzzle -- counseling vs. coaching, the story of Ruben and Jesusita Hernandez.

Privacy breaches offer ‘teaching moment’ for financial education

By Pam Bailey, NeighborWorks America blogger

One of the most effective ways to stay relevant to your community, build support and attract positive attention is to tie your services and message into “hot topics” in the media and around the kitchen table. One of those hot topics these days is the security of personal data, triggered by the theft of credit and debit card numbers and the personal information — including names, email addresses, phone numbers and home addresses — of as many as 70 million Target customers.

This conquest of hackers of corporate America made big news. However, while it was indeed one of the biggest such breaches of privacy in U.S. history, it was only the latest in an increasing trend. Also last year, the Barnes & Noble bookstore chain reported that someone had planted software in PIN-pad devices at 63 of its stores in nine states, stealing data from cards’ magnetic stripes when swiped. And it’s not just chain stores that are at risk. In January, the U.S. district attorney in Manhattan announced indictments of 13 people for installing Bluetooth-enabled, banking-data-gobbling skimmers at gas stations.

Participants listen closely in one of NBRV's financial-
education classes. 

NeighborWorks Blackstone River Valley (Woonsocket, RI) recognizes a “teaching moment” when it sees one. Drawing on the expertise of its financial-education coaches, it responded with a list of tips for preventing identity theft on its website and in its e-newsletter, which it sent to its 1,000-plus subscribers as well as to more than 1,000 clients. Readers are directed to contact the NBRV team for a personal credit analysis. (Now, that’s a newsworthy call to action!)

“How to protect personal data has always been an important part of our counseling program,” says Ainsley Morisseau Cantoral, director of resource development and communications for NWBRV. “But with identity theft in the news, our homeownership staff and I saw an opportunity to reach out to a broader audience.”

Cantoral is passionate about her organization’s outreach programs because she knows what it feels like to be faced with a financial crisis. Several years ago, someone stole her Social Security number and used it to obtain a credit card, putting her into serious debt. Her family also had experience the foreclosure crisis firsthand.  Working to promote NWBRV's Homeownership Center is an ideal “match” for her.

Ten years ago, NWBRV was among the first NeighborWorks network members to open a homeownership center.  A credit review was a standard element of the coaching the organization provided potential homeowners. However, four years ago, NWBRV began broadening its financial-education services in response to a worsening economy in which credit was becoming more difficult to understand and improve for a broader population.  And in 2011, the Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC) chose NWBRV as one of the partner agencies to run a state Financial Opportunity Center. Through the center, residents can access employment counseling, personal financial-management assistance and help in accessing public benefits such as food stamps and health care insurance. Recently, to serve a greater number of residents, NWBRV decided to supplement the center’s four-week-long financial-management series with six, stand-alone, one-hour workshops on specific topics such as improving your credit score.

“When we were brainstorming, it became clear that our clients’ needs are very diverse, and the series couldn't do justice to them all,” explains Cantoral. “For example, in one series, the participants might include a homeowner facing foreclosure mitigation, someone transitioning to rental unit from the local homeless shelter, and another individual preparing to buy a home for the first time. Their financial coaching needs are very different but our curriculum was trying to be ‘everything to everybody.’"

Data security will be among those topics, as NWBRV continues to adapt to respond to the changing needs and concerns of its community.

Lease-to-purchase program provides pathway to homeownership

By Pam Bailey, blogger for NeighborWorks America

Kalamazoo, MI, was hard hit by the housing crisis. Traditionally a first-mortgage lender, with 600 loans in its portfolio, Kalamazoo Neighborhood Housing Services could no longer offer that assistance as banks pulled back. Meanwhile, as unemployment also soared, foreclosures swept the city and even now, four years later, home values are stagnating and lack of investment is destabilizing the neighborhoods.

“We needed a strategy to provide a bridge to homeownership, while also stabilizing the community by avoiding the abandoned buildings and absentee landlords experienced elsewhere,” says Matt Lager, executive director of NHS, which recently celebrated 20 years of membership in the NeighborWorks network. “So we developed a lease-to-purchase program.  The formula is simple: We acquire and rehab a vacant or foreclosed property on a target block, lease to clients who are just shy of mortgage-ready and prepare them to become homeowners. The result: We now have a pipeline of families who will transition to homeowners within 12 to 18 months.”

One of the families now leasing a home, with plans
to purchase. 

In the first two years of the program, Lager’s organization acquired 11 houses outright, thanks to a combination of land donations, grants and capital from NeighborWorks America. Five more acquisitions are planned for the coming year. Demand has been high, with 20 “bidders” for every home available. In return for the affordable lease and down payment assistance when the time comes, renters agree to participate in monthly financial-management coaching sessions. If they don’t follow through, or decide not to purchase within two years, they lose their “option fee,” equivalent of one month’s rent. (If participants comply with the action plan they develop with their coach, the purchase deadline can be extended.)

To date, the program has a high success rate: Four of the participants will become homeowners in the first half of 2014; only two have opted out due to what Lager calls the programs initial “learning curve.”

Lessons learned

“One of the lessons we learned in implementing this program is to select and then rehab houses that would attract future homeowners,” explains Lager. “People need to fall in love with a house to stay motivated.”

The other lesson Lager’s team would pass on to others who might want to offer a similar program is that it requires deep relationships with leasers.

“Although the financial-management sessions are focused on budgets, repairing their credit, etc., you can’t help but get involved in all of the other issues that dictate whether these families can be successful at homeownership,” says Lager, adding that the NHS financial-capability coaches have backgrounds in social work. “That means dealing with unemployment, for instance, and similar challenges.”

Foreclosures may have gone down, but the financial struggles of the approximately 21,000 people living in the six neighborhoods served by NHS continue, and the “lease-purchase” program will help provide a pathway to homeownership.

Forty-five years after founding, Pennsylvania group helps future homebuyers achieve ‘financial freedom’

When visitors walk into the NeighborWorks America offices in DC, one of the first images they see is a floor-to-ceiling painting of Dorothy Mae Richardson, along with the quote, “I believe people get their roots down when they own their own houses….take pride in them. That, in turn, is good for the whole city.”

Dorothy Mae Richardson

These wise words can be generalized to cities everywhere, but in 1968, Richardson – the “founding mother” of NeighborWorks America -- was speaking specifically about Pittsburgh, where she enlisted bankers and government officials to support her block club’s efforts to improve her neighborhood. Together, they persuaded 16 financial institutions and a local foundation to put up the loans needed to create opportunities for affordable homeownership. They named the program Neighborhood Housing Services, and it served as the model for other programs that followed -- today known as NeighborWorks organizations.

Forty-five years later, the NeighborWorks network encompasses more than 240 such organizations, and the group founded by Richardson is still going strong, known as NeighborWorks Western Pennsylvania. The dynamics of the community, however, along with the services needed by residents, have changed – and the organization has adapted along with it.

“More people own their own homes here now, thanks to our efforts,” says Margie Howard, education specialist with NeighborWorks Western Pennsylvania. “But we’ve realized that more than homeownership education and counseling are needed.  Residents also need help keeping their homes in good shape, staying out of foreclosure and managing their budgets to make it all affordable. In particular, we are serving a growing number of low-income, single heads of household. Race isn’t the issue here; economics is.”

While the organization has offered financial education for youth for the past five years, recent support from the Heinz Endowments has made it possible to expand its efforts to include the entire family, combating generational poverty.

 “We saw that parents weren’t teaching their children about money management – mainly because they themselves didn’t learn it,” Howard explains. “You see lots of instances of a mom spending $300 on shoes for her child, yet there’s a shortage of food in the house, or maybe the family is about to be evicted. It’s not just about teaching parents how to budget; it’s about changing attitudes and behavior around money.”

Youth don’t get financial education in the schools either, says Howard. “Schools are test- rather than life-skills-oriented.”

One of the youth financial-education classes

The organization’s youth financial-education program enrolls participants as young as 14 up through age 25, with instruction provided in four, one-hour classes. The program’s practical approach encourages participants to analyze real-life spending choices, such as getting ready for prom.

“The average girl realizes it will cost about $3,000 for a one-day event; for boys, it’s more like $1,000.  Many are okay with these figures when it’s their parents who foot the bill,” explains Howard. “But then they are asked what will happen if their mom has been laid off, or is working a minimum-wage job. How will she afford that while keeping up with the bills? Some of the students find ways to cut back like having a friend style their hair or using a parent’s car instead of renting a fancy one. Others decide to skip the prom altogether. The goal is to teach them to analyze their wants vs.  their needs. We see how their thinking changes when they realize they might have to pay for things themselves.”

The key, says Howard, is to separate spending from emotional triggers, starting with tracking where the money is going with a daily log. Ideally, major spending decisions should be made collectively, by the entire family.  Although teenagers typically prefer to attend workshops with youth from their own age group, family members from different generations are encouraged to come to one of the workshops together. Howard recalls one time when a 10-year-old girl came with her mother to a class because she didn’t want to go to the gym with her brother. After the workshop, the little girl went up to the instructor and proudly reported that she had her own bank account. The teacher asked what the girl would do with the savings, and she replied, “I want to have a princess birthday party.”

“A 10-year-old is breaking the cycle by planning ahead to make sure she has the money she needs to meet her goals,” says Howard. “We’ve created a saver!”

Long-term results from the financial-capability workshops are still being assessed, but the anecdotes are promising. One recent evening, for instance, Howard was approached at a community event by Essence Howze, who completed the organization’s financial-education program five years before, when she was just 16. Always ambitious, Howze first began earning money at age 9, manning a refreshment stand in front of her home. “I would sell iced tea and lemonade to joggers,” she laughs.

Essence Howze

However, self-teaching could get her only so far. When she was in 10th grade, Howze saw a flyer on a bulletin board, promoting NeighborWorks Western Pennsylvania’s youth financial-education program. Howze enrolled, and the practical skills she learned, she says, enabled her to open her own savings account and enter community college, where today she is a sophomore studying business management. Always ambitious, she has supplemented her studies with extracurricular activities such as an internship with The Salvation Army’s Career Development Center, and recently started her own business -- which she calls “Silver Linings,” through which she helps others overcome personal barriers like those she faced during a troubled family life.

“Taking the NeighborWorks financial-education course gave me my financial freedom. It helped me avoid so many mistakes, and now I’m helping others,” Howze says, recalling how she showed her college roommate how to read the “fine print” when a credit card company tried to sign her up. “I refer back to the materials I got in those workshops all the time. It wasn’t just financial management I learned..it was empowerment.”

Written by Pam Bailey, communications writer for NeighborWorks America. 

Pathfinder Services evolves in surprising directions to meet Indiana’s changing needs

Of all of the organizations we have researched for this anniversary series, Pathfinder Services of Huntington, IN, has evolved the most dramatically over its 47-year history (the last five as a charter member of NeighborWorks America). And it is among the most diverse as it reaches across sectors – housing, education and job creation to name just a few – to serve its community and fund its programs. Its story is a tale of flexibility, nimbleness and a willingness to take calculated risks.

The roots of the organizations extend back to 1966, when it began as a local affiliate of the Indiana Association for Retarded Children. At the time, a movement was sweeping the country to de-institutionalize people with developmental disabilities – allowing them to live at home, instead of being warehoused in “asylums.” A group of parents in Huntington recruited supporters and funding, then opened a school (“mainstreaming” had not yet arrived to public education) and a sheltered workshop that offered training and employment.

The organization grew rapidly in the following years, including its first foray into housing, when it opened a halfway house for individuals transitioning to independence. But it wasn’t until the early ‘80s that the organization began to widen its focus to serve the community at large – first, persons with all types of disabilities, and then the broader “collective.”

Transitioning from a focus on disability to broader community development 

John Niederman (light green jacket) mixes with local residents.

“The change in orientation began when the ‘movement’ (for disability rights) began focusing more on integration,” explains John Niederman, who has served as president of the organization since 1985. “Inclusion became a core value, and research showed that too often, people in the community thought of us as ‘that place down the street.’ One of the best ways to integrate is to develop assets – to plug ‘service gaps,’ if you will – that benefit the community as a whole.”

Just before Niederman’s arrival, the organization changed its name to Pathfinder Services, reflecting that broader mission. “We see ourselves as providing the pathways to improve residents’ lives,” he explains. Today, its services include:

• Affordable child care.

• Employment generation, including interview coaching, job training and placement assistance.  In fact, through its “outsource manufacturing” division, individuals with disabilities and others in need of a stable working environment provide businesses with services ranging from assembly to packaging. It’s a win-win-win for all involved: Businesses receive quality work at reasonable cost, Pathfinder earns revenue that funds its programs and employees are able to support themselves while gaining valuable skills. (Pathfinder is a bit of a trailblazer when it comes to creatively leveraging its core competencies to generate income – including product sales and consulting. A future blog post will focus on this topic; sign up in the field to the right of this feature to receive articles in your inbox!)

• Training in personal financial management, including educational courses and assistance in setting up individual development accounts (IDAs) to encourage savings. Reflecting its highly responsive organizational culture, it offers a tailored version of its IDA program customized for newly re-settled refugees, to help them buy a home, start a business or go to school. (Surprisingly, nearby Fort Wayne is thought to have the largest number of Burmese refugees in the United States!)

• Housing-related services ranging from development of low-income housing, homebuyer training (including a recent session offered in Burmese) and assistance with home rehab.

Niederman is proud of the fact that in 1996, Pathfinder became the first and only organization in Indiana to receive funding for its housing initiatives from the newly established rural component of the Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC), and is one of the USDA’s highest-volume partners when it comes to assisting low- to moderate-income individuals apply for rural-oriented "502 direct mortgage loans."

Building social connectedness

A sign promotes one of the
block parties organized by
Pathfinder staff

One of Pathfinder’s more recent community-development initiatives is an outreach program to foster “social connectedness” in targeted neighborhoods. The organization started in an urban neighborhood of Fort Wayne, with the help of a grant from the Indiana Association for Community Economic Development, funded by JP Morgan Chase Bank.

Pathfinder focused on one particular zip code with a population of 17,000, where residents broke into small groups to identify quality-of-life goals on which they most wanted to focus; those that attracted the most support were selected. A strategic plan was drafted to guide the democratically chosen steering committee, which meets every other week. The committee decided that it will not run its own activities, but will instead support and promote existing neighborhood groups and associations through mini-grants and a Facebook page that keeps everyone informed, connected and involved. Pathfinder provides staff to help coordinate the effort and acts as a fiscal agent, working to help identify funding sources.

With “aging in place” a growing trend for older communities, the organization is now moving into the Drover Town neighborhood of rural Huntington, with the encouragement of the town's mayor..

“We received a planning grant from the Indiana Housing and Community Development Authority to develop ‘communities for a lifetime,’ which means making it possible for residents to stay there as long as they want, regardless of age or disability,” explains Jan Baumgartner, community connections director and recipient of a professional certificate in neighborhood revitalization from NeighborWorks America. Increasingly, research is showing that resiliency through social connections is as important as factors such as affordable housing when it comes to the feasibility of aging in place. Consider, for example, a new study from the University of Michigan that found that people who felt connected to their neighbors suffered significantly fewer strokes.

Each community must be approached differently, says Baumgartner, with residents choosing what to focus on and how to operate.

“We’re a facilitator…an enabler,” says Baumgartner. “We’re here to help the people who live in our service areas tap into the resources they need to fully exploit their own strengths.”

Written by Pam Bailey, communications writer for NeighborWorks America. She would love for you to post your own stories and comments!

Texas group profiled in local newspaper for protecting homeownership through tough times

NeighborWorks America is honoring our many creative member organizations this year by featuring in our blog those that are celebrating milestone anniversaries. We were pleased to discover that we didn't have to write a testimonial for NeighborWorks Waco, because the WacoTrib did it for us. Read for yourself...

Robert Jackson expected good things from NeighborWorks Waco.

Jackson was the treasurer of the newly formed Brooks Avenue Neighborhood Association in 1993, when the group decided to contribute $10,000 to help jump start the new housing organization, believing it could help more residents buy homes in the Greater Waco area.

But he didn’t expect that he would wind up being one of those residents who would need the nonprofit group’s help to buy his first home.

Read the full article. 

Vermont quarry closing brings economy down; NeighborWorks affiliate rallies residents

It’s a story that’s been repeated across America: What builds a town up is also what, eventually, brings it down. In Detroit, it was the auto industry. In West Rutland, Vermont, it was marble quarrying.

When high-quality marble deposits were discovered in the 1830s – followed by the extension of the railroad into town – Rutland was suddenly put on the map. The simultaneous decline of the famous quarries of Carrara in Tuscany, Italy, transformed it into one of the leading marble producers in the world. (The name of the main “drag”? “Marble Street,” of course.)

The double-whammy of a large strike in the 1930s and the Great Depression, however, took a toll from which the town never quite recovered. In 1986 the quarry was forced to close, plunging the outwardly idyllic enclave of “cows and jeans” into economic decline.

West Rutland today

“At its height, the quarry alone employed 2,400 people,” recalls Ludy Biddle, executive director of NeighborWorks of Western Vermont. “Now, there are only about 2,500 people living in the entire town and the county is the second-poorest in the state. For all social measures, it’s in the red – poverty, unemployment, teen pregnancies and, recently, foreclosures.”

Another recurring theme in America, however, is the recovery from adversity that’s possible when residents come together in response to crisis. The disastrous year of 1986 also is when the organization was founded by a group of local citizens to help the remaining residents stay in their homes by keeping them in good repair.  By the 1990s, the area serviced by NeighborWorks of Western Vermont had expanded from four neighborhoods to the entire county and a homeownership program was added to help both first-time buyers and a trickle of newcomers – primarily artists and families looking for a semi-rural lifestyle.

This year, the organization is celebrating its 10th anniversary as a chartered member of the NeighborWorks Rural Initiative, which strengthens communities with small populations by helping them integrate into their regional economies. It now serves three counties, not only with its original rehab assistance and homeownership counseling, but also with “financial fitness” coaching and foreclosure prevention. In 2012:

• Two foreclosed houses were purchased by the organization; rehab was begun on another five, with two completed and put on the market.
• 24 individuals graduated from the homebuyer education program and another 25 completed the organization’s financial-fitness training.
• Thirty-seven families successfully negotiated foreclosure alternatives with their mortgage lenders. Another 12 received coaching as they made the decision to opt for a reverse mortgage.
• Nearly $800,000 in loans was dispensed to pay for 40 home repairs.

Joan Jackson

Biddle is particularly proud of her organization's participation in the NeighborWorks Green Organization. In fact, in 2010, it was awarded a $4.5 million grant from the Department of Energy for its H.E.A.T. squad (Home Efficiency Assistance Team) – which now boasts the highest penetration rate in the country among similar programs.

Joan Jackson, a retired librarian who has lived in her Wallingford home since 1959, is just one example of the 577 households that received an “energy check-up” in 2012, thanks to the program. Her roof had been damaged by winter ice, the house was so cold she was constantly bundling up to stay warm and the increasing cost of fuel was a persistent worry due to her fixed income. But with the installation of insulation in her basement and upstairs walls, along with air sealing around her doors, ceiling and attic hatch, she is warmer and her fuel bills are 34 percent lower. (Watch a video interview with Biddle, as she explains just how the program works.)

“Twenty-five percent of the people we’ve been able to help with our H.E.A.T. squad are below 80 percent of the area’s median income – individuals who usually aren’t able to participate in programs like this, even though they need it the most,” says Biddle, adding that the organization is now looking for additional funds as the DOE grant sunsets. “The average household we serve spends 3-8 percent of their already-low income on energy. With H.E.A.T, they save an average of 386 gallons of fuel a year – about $1,500 a year. It’s central to our mission to make homeownership affordable.”