The article I examined was “Some real estate agents discriminate against black home buyers” which is an article in the Hartford Courant published on May 21, 1989 (1). In 1989, the Courant conducted a random test in which two potential home buyers of different race would enter a real estate agency with the same financial backgrounds and attempt to buy homes. Both the results and reactions towards the random testing proved something very significant to future home buyers in the Hartford metropolitan area: there was a plethora of evidence demonstrating that there was discrimination between each buyer in each of the 15 real estate agencies investigated.
When investigating each agency, the “home buyers” were each treated differently. The African American home buyer would constantly be under scrutiny because of their financial status and never told about the type of education that would be received in the neighborhoods when asking the realtors. Moreover, the African American buyers would only be shown a couple of houses in the suburbs, but steered towards predominantly African American towns and cities (such as Hartford and Bloomfield). However, the white home buyer would not be questioned about their financial status and would be shown a number of homes in suburbs such as West Hartford. Also, white buyers would be taken to see the homes, and they were told all of the success schools have been having in the area. This practice of “steering” home buyers to a certain area had been practiced before he 1980’s with the start of the Great Migration leading a large number of African Americans to Hartford in 1910 (2). Having the ability to sell these people homes in the Hartford metropolitan area gave real estate agents the advantage to change the reputation of a city or suburb through the buyers’ “anxieties about racially mixed schools” (3).
Similarly the same prejudiced that African American home buyers experienced, African American real estate agents would experience when working at a predominantly white real estate agency. In the article “Black agents learn to deal with the real world”, the article exposes the hardships of African American real estate agents in the Hartford Courant. When showing a house to a potential African American buyer, the white real estate agent always scrutinizes the capability in which the buyer can afford the house even though the previous agent (who is African American) has already concluded that the buyer can afford the home. The only way for African American realtors to make sure racial discrimination does not happen is by “threatening them with the rules”(4).
Sources:
(1) Bixby, Lyn, Brant Houston, Jeffrey Williams, and Larry Williams. “Some Real Estate Agents Discriminate against Back Home Buyers.” The Hartford Courant 21 May 1989: n. pag. Print.
(2) Tuckel, P., K. Schlichting, and R. Maisel. “Social, Economic, and Residential Diversity Within Hartford’s African American Community at the Beginning of the Great Migration.” Journal of Black Studies 37.5 (2007): 710-36. Print.
I found this citation through JSTOR by searching under “Hartford”, “real estate”, and “discrimination”.
(3) Dougherty, Jack. “Shopping for Schools: How Public Education and Private Housing Shaped Suburban Connecticut.” Journal Of Urban History 38, no. 2 (March 2012): 205-224. America: History & Life, EBSCOhost (accessed September 15, 2013).
I found this journal through America:History and Life by searching the key words “Hartford”, “discrimination”, “1989”, and “real estate”.
(4) Williams, Larry. “Black Agents Learn to Deal with the Real World.” The Hartford Courant 21 May 1989: n. pag. Print.
(5) Beeching, Barbara J. 2005. “Reading the Numbers: Census Returns as Key to the Nineteenth Century Black Community in Hartford, Connecticut.” Connecticut History 44, no. 2: 224-247. America: History & Life, EBSCOhost (accessed September 15, 2013).
I found this article by searching through America: History and Life by searching “Hartford”, “discrimination”, and “real estate”.
Discussion Questions:
1). The accounts given from the real estate agents all claim to have said that they were keeping the best interest in mind for each buyer when choosing to show them houses. Do you think there was a different between whether an African American real estate agent or white real estate agent was dealing with a buyer with the opposite race? Why or why not?
2) In considering the different options given from each real estate agent, do you think a buyer that was African American could receive more options from consulting with numerous real estate agents? Why or why not?
3) Some real estate agents chose to show some African American home buyers a select couple of houses in suburbs in West Hartford and suburbs similar to it. Why do you think real estate agents did this? What kind of conditions do you think these homes were in?