Welcome to SAHARAA - Monthly Newsletter

You are invited to join SAREAA, a site that helps first time South Asian Homebuyers realize their American Dream of Home Ownership.


Past Events

South Asian Real Estate Association of America conducted a Workshop on "Cross-Cultural Communication in Real Estate" on July 25, 2007 at Mayuri Indian Cuisine, Santa Clara. The session was conducted by veteran real estate and loan trainer
Mary Shoane of REL (Real Estate and Loan School), who has a background in action reduction.

The workshop offered guidelines on cross-cultural awareness to help bilingual agents speak with confidence. The workshop also offered tips on how to communicate effectively.


SAREAA has a mission to promote the general success of South Asian American real estate professionals by providing the opportunities to network with fellow real estate professionals serving South Asian American housing market, through a nationwide network.

SAREAA membership is presently FREE to all Real Estate practitioners who abide by the NAR code of ethics and are serving the South Asian American communities helping them realize their American Dream of Homeownership. To join SAREAA, visit www.SAREAA.com.

SAREAA, the South Asian Real Estate Association of America has been incorporated in the State of California as a Non Profit Mutual Benefit Corporation and is dedicated to the mission of providing the Consumers resources that will help them realize their American Dream of homeownership.

SAREAA will provide the consumers a web based countrywide database of real estate professionals who speak South Asian languages and or understand the real estate needs of the South Asian communities. The users will be able to search the database of real estate practitioners easily by visiting the web site www.SAREAA.com and clicking on the "Find a Member" link.

SAREAA is also developing SAHARAA, a multilingual resource center that will help both the consumers and real estate practitioners & affiliated businesses understand the real estate and mortgage processes in their language of choice. The consumers can visit the web site www.SAHARAA.org and learn about the home buying, selling, mortgage loan and other financial assistance programs by choosing the language of their choice, that is, English, Hindi, Punjabi, Urdu, Gujarati, Tamil, Telugu or Bengali.

"SAREAA will be an important resource in our community" said Colleen Badagliacco, President, California Association of REALTORS® while commending the efforts made by SAREAA in developing a multilingual resource center.

Allen M Okamoto, Chairman, Asian Real Estate Association of America has rightly said that, "It is groups such as SAREAA that will help close the homeownership gap experienced by Asians" and "will create a level playing field so that all Asians will have the equal opportunity to compete for the American Dream of Homeownership".

"Building the Community with Bricks and Trust" is the slogan for SAREAA.

SAREAA membership is free to real estate practitioners and affiliates who believe in helping the communities realize their American Dream of homeownership.

To join SAREAA visit www.SAREAA.com or write to SAREAA, P O Box 18243, San Jose, CA 95158.

Would you like to advertise on this NL? The rates are as follows:
Quarter page $600 for one year. Visiting Card size (3.5"x2") $300 for a year.
Copy to be provided by the advertiser. Write to info@saharaa.org


Asian Americans Propel Housing Market

Asian Americans represent a strong and fast-growing segment of home owners, according to a recent study conducted by the Asian Real Estate Association of America and the UCLA Asian American Studies Center.

“They’re a fast-growing market, with a homeownership rate that grew by 7 percentage points, from 52.9 percent in 2000 to 59.9 percent in 2005,” says Jim Park, president and chief executive officer of AREAA. “To gain that much while the population is growing is a tremendous testimony to this community.”

Such a jump also is unusual, considering newly arrived immigrants don’t typically buy homes for the first few years they’re in the country.


Continued Growth Seen

Looking ahead, Park anticipates continued growth from this segment. Asian Americans, he says, have the highest median income, the highest credit profile, and the lowest foreclosure rate of any ethnic group in the country. Additionally, 45 percent have a college degree.

“If you project out eight to 10 years, those people are going to be buying houses. This community is going to keep booming,” Park predicts.

In addition, Asian immigrants who arrived in the United States in 1974 or earlier now are able to either own more than one home, move up to a larger and more expensive home, or both, the study's authors say.

The largest Asian communities are located in California, New York, and Texas. The latter might be a surprise to many. “People don’t realize how big the population is in Texas," Park says. "A huge chunk of our membership base is out of Houston.”Growing, too, are Asian populations in states such as Georgia and Nevada.


Language a Major Barrier

However, for all of the factors working in favor of Asian Americans becoming home owners, there are still significant cultural, social, and economic barriers, the UCLA study finds.

The report underscores language barriers in the Asian American community. The Asian and Pacific American market includes more than 13 ethnic groups and is largely foreign born - 50 percent more than other ethnic groups.

To expand home ownership to more people in the Asian community, AREAA advocates having more educational materials about the housing market translated into various Asian languages.

After the language barrier, the study identified a lack of knowledge about the home buying process, unverifiable income, lack of credit, and a fear of being "ripped off" as top factors getting in the way of home ownership for Asian Americans.


First-Ever AREAA Convention

Because of their importance to the housing market, Asian Americans will be the focus of AREAA's first annual convention, to be held in Long Beach, Calif., Oct. 15 and 16. The convention will “bring together leading thinkers and real estate professionals to talk about some of the issues facing the Asian American housing market,” says Park.

Asian American practitioners will have the opportunity to explore ways to expand their practices into international markets and real estate-owned business - opportunities that will help practitioners adapt to a slowing market.

The conference will include AREAA’s certified education course and will explore legal and regulatory issues in some states. For instance, in California, a regulation says that whatever language a transaction is initiated in is the language that it must remain in.

- By Camilla McLaughlin for REALTOR® Magazine Online

Courtesy: http://www.realtor.org

Naturalized Citizens Have Higher Homeownership Rates

A new report from the U.S. Census Bureau shows the impact of naturalized U.S. citizens on the housing market.

- By Tom Dooley

African Americans, Asian and Pacific Islander Americans, and Hispanics who are naturalized U.S. citizens have higher homeownership rates than their U.S.-born racial and ethnic counterparts, according to a new report from the U.S. Census Bureau.

The report, “Moving to America - Moving to Homeownership: 1994 - 2002” shows that a slightly higher proportion (51 percent) of African American naturalized citizens owned their own homes, compared with native-born African Americans (49 percent). However, the difference is much higher for Asian and Pacific Islander Americans (a 70 percent homeownership rate for naturalized citizens, compared with 57 percent for Asian and Pacific Islander Americans born in the United States) and Hispanics (a 63 percent homeownership rate for Hispanic naturalized citizens, compared with a 54 percent rate for U.S.-born Hispanics).

At the same time, the homeownership rate for non-Hispanic white householders born in the United States (75 percent) was only slightly higher than the rate for non-Hispanic white, naturalized citizens (74 percent).

Overall, the 2002 homeownership rates for U.S.-born Americans (70 percent), naturalized citizens (68 percent), and non-citizens (35 percent) were near their highest levels since data was first collected on this topic in 1994.

Courtesy: www.realtor.org