I have traveled to many regions of the United States. One norm I see around downtown areas, big or small, is the vast amount of large “run down” houses. What caused what appears to be once nice neighborhoods to deteriorate over time? Why was the problem so widespread across the United States?
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White Flight
Cities used to be more urban before the rise of cars, and people lived closer to the city center. Then a couple things happened… one, government began backing mortgages, but defined areas by safety/quality of investment. Basically, the more minorities, the lower the rating… green were best, yellow were marginal, red were areas that the government wouldn’t back — this is the basis of the term “red lining.” Any area with African-Americans was labeled “blighted” and it was hard to get a mortgage in those areas, or get decent interest rates, due to the red-line status. So white owners sold and fled before their property values fell.
The second thing that happened was the rise of the suburbs. In the post-WWII era, vast suburbs sprung up outside of major cities, offering single family homes with yards, driveways and garages for automobiles that were now widely affordable, and new highways made it easy to commute to jobs in the city quickly. So the middle class migrated en mass from the city out to the suburbs, wanting to enjoy the idyllic lifestyle, and getting out of the city that was becoming more diverse (more areas getting red lined, affecting property values).
And long with middle class residents went their tax dollars. As higher income earners left the cities, tax revenues fell. Concentrations of middle class home owners were replaced by lower income renters. Property values fell, property tax revenues fell, city services were cut due to a combination of budgets and racism. Concurently, many cities lost higher paying blue collar jobs in factories and such, reducing the well paying job prospects for African-Americans. Crime rose, drugs became more common, etc. and caused areas to actually fall into disrepair, caused properties to get abandoned when they became not worth the hassle. Those who could escape did, especially once fair housing laws made it easier for minorities to flee to other parts of cities or even into the suburbs.
As a result, you do have some incredible homes that were once home to upper-middle class types, that over time worked their way down the socio-economic scale, often split into multi-unit apartments, and sometimes even becoming abandoned. Areas of Chicago like Englewood were once upper middle class and are now notoriously bad areas. Lawndale was like 90% white, mostly middle class Jewish in 1950 and by 1960 was 90% African-American.
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