It’s ‘Great Being Home’ in the City of Green Bay

Rich Palzewic

Staff

December 16, 2022

GREEN BAY – The Greater Green Bay Chamber, the City of Green Bay and NeighborWorks Green Bay recently announced an initiative aimed at attracting and retaining talent.

The Great Being Home program will provide eligible buyers with a $5,000 grant in addition to other assistance programs for which they may qualify – up to $10,000 total.

Building on what’s already there
NeighborWorks Executive Director Noel Halverson said the program has actually been around for quite some time, but an expansion is needed.

“It can’t continue to be the best-kept secret,” he said. “We need to get more employers engaged in this.”

Over the past 40 years of service, Halverson said NeighborWorks has helped thousands of home buyers.

“We have helped 19,827 families with our home buyer education and counseling services over the last 40 years,” he said. “We have helped 3,861 families purchase homes, and we’ve leveraged our modest resources – like the new funding we’re talking about today – to help families of Green Bay employers purchase homes in Green Bay. We’ve leveraged those resources into more than $541 million in community investment.”

Halverson said employers are becoming increasingly aware that homeownership is critical to attraction/retention.

“It’s also increasingly becoming a factor for employees considering taking jobs,” he said. “If they can’t find housing, that’s going to be a problem. These are the tools that will help families buy homes in the community.”

Halverson said the city currently has some housing challenges.

“This program is going to shine a bright light on that, and we’ll hopefully get more homeowners and more housing built,” he said.

Halverson said the initiative will also help increase awareness and resources for homeownership among local employees, increase homeownership rates within the city and strengthen neighborhoods.

“Homeownership is a big deal for a lot of folks,” he said. “We know children of homeowners do better in high school, are more likely to attend college and perform better on standardized tests. Folks who are homeowners tend to be more active in the civic life of their communities, and they’re more likely to attend public events and feel better overall.”

Halverson said these are not absolute factors, but they are based on studies NeighborWorks has done.

“We know homeownership has tremendous benefits,” he said. “It has a positive impact on the lives of children because there’s less turnover and more stability.”
 
Eligible buyers
Green Bay Mayor Eric Genrich said though the program has been around for quite some time, the difference this news push involves collaboration.

“The twist is the collaborative efforts of those involved – bringing this program to a new level and inviting additional employers,” he said. “The American Foods group has been doing this for some time, but we want to spread the word among the business community that this is an opportunity for others to participate.”

Genrich said the program is available to City of Green Bay employees – both current and prospective police officers and firefighters, as well as members of the public works and parks departments.

“If they’re locating within an eligible neighborhood – a lower to moderate income neighborhood within the city of Green Bay – we’re interested in maintaining and fostering economic socioeconomic diversity within this community,” he said. “Whatever we can do to attract employees – especially police and fire – into some of our central city neighborhoods is a benefit.”

Genrich said other eligible buyers include:
Employees of Green Bay headquartered nonprofits and businesses with 25 or fewer employees.Employees of larger Green Bay employers who contribute to the Great Being Home program. 
Program requirements
Halverson said all applicants must complete pre-purchase education and counseling provided by NeighborWorks Green Bay and comply with other program requirements before receiving assistance.

“After all of that, applicants work with our lending team and come up with a package of assistance, which could include grant funds as well as other resources,” he said.

Halverson said some folks might not be ready for homeownership.

NeighborWorks Green Bay, located at 437 S. Jackson St., has helped almost 4,000 families purchase homes with down payment and closing costs monies. Rich Palzewic Photo

“We can hopefully get them to see that as well, and help them understand what needs to be done,” he said.

Halverson said other requirements include:
The home can be existing or new construction and can be 1-2 units.The home must be owner-occupied and serve as the primary residence of the buyer.The home must be located within the City of Green Bay.For buyers above 80% median income, the home must be in a Qualified Census Tract (areas with a large proportion of low-income residents). 
Pre-purchase education
Halverson said the pre-purchase education applicants go through is “fairly extensive.”

“It helps folks see themselves and their financial position with greater clarity so they can look at that relative to their homeownership goals,” he said. “It might be somebody who comes to the program aspiring to become a homeowner and then realizing they need to work on some other areas – maybe (it’s) their credit or they might need to get their spending under control.”

Halverson said clients coming into the program learn about every aspect of the homebuying process.

“They learn about the real estate process, purchase prices and all the jargon of our lender partners,” he said. “They’re also going to produce a budget and understand what their monthly spending looks like and what that makes available for them to purchase a home. It might take some time to make some adjustments before they’re ready to start shopping and buying a home. Others might find with a couple of tweaks they’re right there.”

Halverson said the program isn’t just about the pre-work, either.

“It’s also about setting folks up to help them avoid some of the pitfalls once they are homeowners,” he said. “We help them manage their expenses and educate them on how to save money for a rainy day or the failure of a major piece of household equipment. All those things are part of the program.”
 
Funding/lenders
Part of what’s moving the refresh of the initiative forward is a $250,000 contribution from the City of Green Bay through America Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds.
“That was very generous,” Halverson said. “We have other sources of down payment and closing cost assistance as well, so we may blend some of those tools. We’re also asking larger employers to participate financially in this program – hopefully, more resources will come. We’ll be refreshing our list to get more partners involved.”

Halverson said one of the great things about the program is they partner with almost any lender.

“We do have some guidelines where the mortgage loans offered by the lender have to conform with some good practices we define,” he said. “If there are terms or rates out of bounds, we might say we can’t put our funds behind that loan – but that’s (doesn’t occur often). We might work with 30-40 community lenders throughout the region in any given year to help families purchase homes.”

Chamber’s role
Mary Rhode, director of marketing for the Greater Green Bay Chamber, said the collaborative work is an initiative of the chamber’s housing working group under the DEI (Diversity, Equity and Inclusion).

“The DEI task force was created by the chamber’s economic development strategic plan,” she said. “This collaboration was made possible by convening partners such as the city, nonprofits and private businesses. The chamber brings an extensive business membership base to leverage the city’s investment in the ARPA dollars.”

For more information on the Great Being Home initiative, visit greatbeinghome@nwgreenbay.org.