Predatory Equity: The Survival Guide

Thanks to Dr. Pop.org for leading us to this today.

The Center for Urban Pedagogy in New York connects artists/designers with advocates to produce Making Public Policy four times a year. The end product of the collaboration is a beautiful, brilliant, highly informative, and easy to understand pamphlet that unfolds into a color poster.

According to their website:

The series aims to make information on policy truly public: accessible, meaningful, and shared. We aim to add vitality to crucial debates about our future. At the same time, we want to create opportunities for designers to engage social issues without sacrificing experimentation and for advocacy organizations to reach their constituencies better through design.




The latest issue of Making Public Policy is called "Predatory Equity: The Survival Guide." Predatory equity, of course, is the notorious real estate investment model in which buyers pay more for rent-regulated housing than can be justified by the rental income, and then force out tenants so that they can raise rents. You can read our recent post about how CalPERS has invested California public employee pension dollars in predatory equity schemes in NYC and East Palo Alto.

Here's what the folks at Making Public Policy have to say about their latest publication.

During the boom, a new breed of speculator used private equity and oversized bank loans to buy up affordable housing. They tried to make a quick profit by converting it to luxury housing – putting over 65,000 families and their affordable apartments at risk. Post-crash, these predatory equity speculators can’t pay off their loans or sell their buildings. Foreclosure looms. Predatory Equity: The Survival Guide explains the financial mechanics of predatory equity and how to prevent it from happening again in the next boom. It provides tenants, advocates, and policymakers with information on tools like loan modifications and preservation short sales to save the hundreds of buildings in imminent danger of foreclosure. The poster was produced through a collaboration between Tenants & Neighbors, the Urban Homesteading Assistance Board, and Glen Cummings.

To purchase Predatory Equity: The Survival Guide through paypal, click here. To buy more than 20 issues, or to purchase by check, please email us here.

To download a pdf version, click here.