Anita Hill focuses on the particular toll predatory lending takes on female home-owners. In Massachusetts, for example, one-third of first-time home buyers are single women, as are a quarter of all home buyers. Like many buyers, single women who qualify for conventional loans are often steered toward subprimes anyhow. But unlike men, brokers push women at much higher income levels to accept subprime conditions:
Women borrowers are overrepresented in the subprime lending market according to studies done by both the Consumer Federation of America and the National Community Reinvestment Coalition. Across the economic spectrum, women receive less favorable terms than similarly situated men on home purchase, refinance, and home improvement loans. The studies also show that the gap between women and men receiving subprime loans actually increases as women's income increases.
--Dana Goldstein
