Lending & Investment Snapshot
for Humboldt Park (Chicago Ave) INVEST South/West priority corridor
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Demographics
Demographics data considers all 3 Census tracts
Demographics source & margins of error
U.S. Census, American Community Survey (ACS) 5-year (2015-2019). All Census data has a "margin of error" (MoE). Use Census Reporter, a third-party website, to explore the MoE for the data in each Census tract.
What is Lending & Investment Snapshot?
Chicago Cityscape created the Lending & Investment Snapshot to bring together data and research about neighborhood-level investments. Use this information to comparatively analyze different parts of Chicago and Cook County. Data in this snapshot can be used to support a place-based investment strategy.
What's in this snapshot
- Home mortgages
- Small business loans
- Business licenses
- City of Chicago-funded projects
- Property sales
- Redlining
Applicant data Who applied for a new mortgage in Humboldt Park (Chicago Ave)
These 3 Census tracts
"Race - ethnicity", as recorded on the loan application (ordered by most to fewest applications)
Citywide applicants
Lender data Who issued mortgage loans in Humboldt Park (Chicago Ave)
These 3 Census tracts
Citywide lenders
Review our home mortgage data source in the "Why we made Lending & Investment Snapshot" at the end of the page.
Small business loans data from 2018, as reported by banks
The table's bottom row and the chart's right-most column shows the average of 3 Census tracts that overlap Humboldt Park (Chicago Ave) (shown in black on the map)
Most insured depository institutions (banks and credit unions) are required to report certain information about loans made to businesses in their service area, as regulated by the rules that implement the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) to ensure that the institutions make loans to businesses in low and moderate-income areas.
Notes
- Small business loans are those worth $1 million or less
- Cook County tracts are larger in geographic area in Chicago tracts, so it is not surprising that there is more lending happening in the average Cook suburban County tract.
- "Mission lending" is not counted here. See the Urban Institute report in "Why we made Lending & Investment Snapshot" below for more info.
| Tracts in category | # of loans <= $100,000 | Subtotal of loans <= $100k | # of loans $100k-250k | Subtotal of loans $100k-250k | # of loans > $250k | Subtotal of loans > $250k | Portion of loans to small biz w/gross revenue < $1m | Total loans | Total value | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Average Chicago tract | 873 | 70 | $867,290 | 2 | $413,673 | 3 | $1,662,404 | 34 | 75 | $2,943,367 |
| Average suburban Cook County tract | 480 | 122 | $1,597,565 | 4 | $734,908 | 4 | $2,356,429 | 59 | 131 | $4,688,902 |
| Average Cook County tract | 1,317 | 88 | $1,115,705 | 3 | $522,947 | 3 | $1,898,488 | 43 | 94 | $3,537,140 |
| These tracts (average) | 21.7 | $159,667 | 0.7 | $112,333 | 0.7 | $274,000 | 23.0 | $546,000 |
Small business loans total for Humboldt Park (Chicago Ave)
| Total number of loans | 69 |
| Total loan value | $1,638,000 |
Business licenses Humboldt Park (Chicago Ave)
Business licenses stats Humboldt Park (Chicago Ave)
Historical license stats on July 1 of each year
Public investments in Humboldt Park (Chicago Ave) 27 projects funded by City of Chicago
TIF-funded projects
There are 1 TIF-funded project in Humboldt Park (Chicago Ave)
There are 4 overlapping TIF districts (view them in Surrounding Places or Incentives Checker in this Place Snapshot). The City of Chicago has not updated its TIF-funded projects list since November 2019. Chicago Cityscape has brought this to the attention of the relevant managers. Data is available for projects since 2009. Data about a project's status and the amount actually spent is not available in this dataset.
Neighborhood Opportunity Fund (NOF) projects
There are 0 completed projects in Humboldt Park (Chicago Ave) funded by the Neighborhood Opportunity Fund (NOF)
The City of Chicago dataset shows only completed projects (those that received a final funding payment), and is updated quarterly. Visit the official Neighborhood Opportunity Fund website to see all approved applications (there are over 200 citywide).
"Large" projects are those requesting $250,000 or more in grant funds and require Chicago City Council approval, and a "Redevelopment Agreement" (RDA) that governs the grant's terms, including minimum DBE participation, prevailing wages, and City residency construction requirements.
Small Business Improvement Fund (SBIF) projects
There are 26 completed projects in Humboldt Park (Chicago Ave) funded by the Small Business Improvement Fund (SBIF)
The City of Chicago dataset shows only completed projects (those that received a final funding payment), and is updated quarterly.
Property Sales Humboldt Park (Chicago Ave)
Property sales for the last 16 quarters
Property sales data loading...
We are unable to map 1,313 property sales in Cook County, which may include some property sales in this area. See all sales in Cook County property transactions (PTAX).
Dive deep into property sales data in the Place Snapshot for Humboldt Park (Chicago Ave).
Redlining is not just a map
What is "redlining"?
Redlining was a federal government-sponsored activity that mapped areas where federally-guaranteed loans would and wouldn't be "secure". It was banned by the 1968 Fair Housing Act.
In 1975, Illinois Governor Dan Walker testified to the U.S. Senate Banking Committee, in which he reiterated 11 methods that redlining was still manifested. The list was created by the Housing Training & Information Center, an institute founded by the National People's Action on Housing, a community-based organization founded in the Austin community of Chicago.
- Requiring down payments of a higher amount than are usually required for financing comparable properties in other areas.
- Fixing loan interest rates in amounts higher than those set for all or most other mortgages in other areas.
- Fixing loan closing costs in amounts higher than those set for all or most other mortgages in other areas.
- Fixing loan maturities below the number of years to maturity set for all or most other mortgages in other areas.
- Refusing to lend on properties above a prescribed maximum number of years of age.
Read the other six redlining methods
- Refusing to make loans in dollar amounts below a certain minimum figure, thus excluding many of the lower-priced properties often found in neighborhoods where redlining is practiced.
- Refusing to lend on the basis of presumed "economic obsolescence" no matter what the condition of an older property may be.
- Stalling on appraisals to discourage potential borrowers.
- Setting appraisals in amounts below what market value actually should, thus making home purchase transactions more difficult to accomplish.
- Applying structural appraisal standards of a much more rigid nature than those applied for comparable properties in other areas.
- Charging discount "points" as a way of discouraging financing.
The effects of redlining and yellowlining in the late 1930s and early 1940s are detectable in 2021. Further reading:
- "After Redlining: The Urban Reinvestment Movement in the Era of Financial Deregulation" by Rebecca Marchiel.
- In U.S. Cities, The Health Effects Of Past Housing Discrimination Are Plain To See (NPR, November 19, 2020, by Maria Godoy)
- Following the Yellowlined Road - Yellowlining—the lesser cousin of federal-government redlining—was a discriminatory force that historians and economists have only begun to explore (South Side Weekly, October 29, 2020, by Dave Reidy)
Additional Snapshots
Transportation & Jobs
Locate transit & transportation assets, cargo facilities, commute statistics, and job locations.
Why we made Lending & Investment Snapshot
Lending & Investment Snapshot was inspired by a report from the Urban Institute: Neighborhood Disparities in Investment Flows in Chicago (PDF).
As part of place-based investment strategies, it's important to know that "owner-occupied homes in black neighborhoods are undervalued by $48,000 per home on average, amounting to $156 billion in cumulative losses" ("The devaluation of assets in black neighborhoods" by Andre M. Perry, Jonathan Rothwell, and David Harshbarger/Brookings Institution).
Mortgage lending discrimination
Racial discrimination in home lending in Chicago was shown to be happening in 1974, when community activists (including Organization for a Better Austin, National People's Action, Contract Buyers League, with assistance from the Center for Urban Affairs at Northwestern University) demanded disclosure, and "after several years of meetings, picketing, and direct action protests by the NPA, the Federal Home Loan Bank Board of Chicago gave in. [They] agreed to provide the NPA with data on selected loans by zip code for the years 1971-1973" ("Family Properties" by Beryl Satter).
In December 1974, a State of Illinois commission reported that "the extent of redlining is impossible to determine, altho [sic] there is substantial evidence that it exists", according to the Chicago Tribune. "The commission...also urged legislation requiring financial institutions to disclose savings and lending data." Gail Cincotta was a primary activist, and a member of the commission. The Tribune reporter Cincotta saying, "Without disclosure we will never know the full extent of redlining and will be unable to effectively monitor financial institutions."
Chicago adopted a mortgage disclosure ordinance on June 26, 1974, that required all banks that held the city's deposits to diclose the location and types of loans they issue (44th Ward Alder Dick Simpson originally introduced the ordinance). This preceded the national Home Mortgage Disclosure Act (HMDA), which provides the data on this page, that was adopted in 1975 (it took effeect in 1976).
- The New York Times found that some Census tracts are "diversifying" because new homeowners are overwhelmingly white (2019)
- Look over the redlining maps drawn by the federal government in the 1930s and used by banks to avoid lending in areas (if a single Black person lived in an area, it was marked red)
Source: We are using Home Mortgage Disclosure Act (HMDA) data that WBEZ and City Bureau assembled.
Additional resources
Small business loan data
The institutions report their qualifying loans in an examination to the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), Federal Reserve Board (FRB), and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC). The data, which we use here, is distributed by the the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council (FFIEC).
These reports are made subject to the Community Reinvestment Act, which Congress passed in 1977.
Reading
- After Redlining: The Urban Reinvestment Movement in the Era of Financial Deregulation by Rebecca K. Marchiel
- The Plunder of Black Wealth in Chicago: New Findings on the Lasting Toll of Predatory Housing Contracts [PDF]
- Black Lives Are Shorter in Chicago. My Family’s History Shows Why. How did a Promised Land to generations of Black families become a community of lost lives? [a personal story by Linda Villarosa]
- Racial Inequality In How Chicago-Area Homes Are Valued Is Increasing by Natalie Moore/WBEZ. The disparity in home values [and appraisals] between white neighborhoods and Black and Latinx communities has increased more than six-fold since 1980.
- This Next City article by Oscar Perry Abello describes, in practical and lay terms, how a Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) evaluation of a bank works (July 13, 2021).
Sources
Demographic information
Demographic information is estimated data based on a sample of the population, taken as part of the annual American Community Survey conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau. In areas with lower populations, the margins of error will be higher. Review the data on Census Reporter to understand the margins of error for each individual Census tract.
* There are significant margins of error within each Census tract. Our method of adding up the number of people within each Census tract in this Place can compound this sampling error. If using this for a report that requires more rigorous analysis, please consult the source data.
Links
The Fund for Equitable Business Growth
Creating a marketplace of services for entrepreneurs of color in the Chicago region to close the racial and ethnic wealth gap and build a more just, equitable and resilient society. A collaboration between The Chicago Community Trust (CCT), The Coleman Foundation, JPMorgan Chase Foundation, Polk Bros. Foundation, Robert R. McCormick Foundation, Leslie Bluhm and David Helfand, Peter and Lucy Ascoli Family Fund, the Liz and Don Thompson Family Fund, the MacArthur Foundation, and Crown Family Philanthropies.
CDFIs finance community businesses, including small businesses, microenterprises, nonprofit organizations, commercial real estate, and affordable housing. To find an OFN member CDFI, use the search filters below.
Community Ownership as a Pathway to “Build Back Better”
The idea of community ownership is a straightforward concept—a community owns the “thing” (usually property) under consideration. The community then must determine which of the many forms of community ownership fits its needs. It can include collective ownership of land and buildings through land trust and co-operatives; it can also include entrepreneurial and cooperative ownership of the businesses that might occupy them. Community ownership envisions opening the ownership of homes, commercial property, and backyard cottages to the people who have built and who maintain the culture of the community. It also opens a pathway for low-income and people of color to local control of community assets. It contemplates the way that people build resilient networks, expand political power, protect, and elevate shared culture, and seed personal wealth. [This link has a guide to different community ownership models.]
Dive into Census data
3 Census tracts analyzed
The United States Census Bureau collects information about people and aggregates it to the "tract" level. In Chicago, a tract is a small area within a neighborhood that is bordered by roads and rivers, and it's the smallest area the Census Bureau uses to provide the greatest amount of detail. Chicago Cityscape grabs data from all of the Census tracts that overlap a Place Snapshot so that you don't need to collect data about each individual tract that comprises a full neighborhood.
The 11-digit numbers below are in the "geoid" or FIPS code format. How to decode: 17 means Illinois, the following three digits indicate the county (031 means Cook County), and the remaining six numbers indicate the Census tract. Use the Cityscape Place Snapshot link to see our data in that tract, and the Census Reporter link to get additional demographic information. You can also click on the Census tracts in the map at the top to locate a specific tract.