Soft Capital, Strong Communities: Emerging Housing Finance Models for Equity and Belonging What if the greatest barrier to home ownership wasn’t income or credit—but the lack of early, flexible capital that trusts people first? From Cincinnati to Denver, South Bend to Boise, innovators are piloting early-stage soft capital tools that build equity, permanence, and community […] The post Soft Capital, Strong Communities: Emerging Housing Finance Models for Equity and Belonging appeared fi...| Neighborhood Economics
Funding the Quarterbacks: Chicago’s Patient, Place-Based Strategy Chicago’s anchors and philanthropy are choosing to fund intermediaries as “community quarterbacks,” doing it patiently and with enough resources to actually move the needle. Two live examples are West Side United’s food-system market formation and Community Desk Chicago’s community-owned real estate work. Why Community Quarterbacks Matter If you […] The post Funding the Quarterbacks: Chicago’s Patient, Place-Bas...| Neighborhood Economics
It’s easy to find stories about what’s broken in our economy, how inequality deepens, systems fail, and despair feels justified. These challenges are real and must be acknowledged. But when they dominate the conversation, we risk missing something equally true: there are hundreds of people, enterprises, funds, and initiatives actively repairing their local economies, quietly, […] The post Join Us in Chicago to See What’s Possible Now appeared first on Neighborhood Economics.| Neighborhood Economics
How Two Strangers Sparked a Citywide Awakening Sometimes, the most powerful outcomes begin with a single unexpected moment. In 2023, Joe Minicozzi of Urban3 took the stage at Neighborhood Economics in Jackson and revealed how property tax systems often force low-income neighborhoods to subsidize wealthier ones. In the crowd was Patton Dodd, director of storytelling […] The post The Tax Map That Changed San Antonio appeared first on Neighborhood Economics.| Neighborhood Economics
I had the opportunity to go last week, with Rosa Lee, to the Ostrom workshop at the University of Indiana to explain the post-disaster economy I see sprouting through several initiatives in and around Swannanoa where we live; it was the epicenter of Hurricane Helene. Our neighborhood, which is often called Swannana-nowhere in the Asheville […] The post An Economy of Reciprocity Based in Abundance appeared first on Neighborhood Economics.| Neighborhood Economics