More than 90% of the homeowners created by NeighborWorks ® network organizations for at least the last five years have been first-time homeowners, a statistic NeigborWorks America’s Business Intelligence team has been highligting. In fiscal year 2025, the share of first-time homebuyers who bought a home through the NeighborWorks network reached 94%. 

What’s more, this comes at a time when the national share of first-time homebuyers is much lower than usual, at 21%.

Monica Dixon hadn’t heard the term “passive home” until she was looking at buying one. But two things became clear soon after she talked with NeighborGood Partners, the NeighborWorks® network organization that created the first passive homes in the state of Delaware. 

Data tells a story.

At NeighborWorks® America, the data tells the story of new homeowners. It tells the story of homes repaired and of communities working together to make their neighborhoods what they want them to be. It tells the story of families and individuals connecting to education, to jobs and to better health, all by finding a safe place to call home.

NeighborWorks’ annual impact report highlights the data of NeighborWorks and the network – and the stories behind it.

Walk through the hallways of the Robert “Bobby” Calvillo HomeOwnership Center at Affordable Homes of South Texas, and you will see portraits – not just of leaders and board members who have worked there, but of families and individuals, holding keys to a new home. 

National Homeownership Month is a time to focus on the path to the place you call home and on the resources to get there. The month might be wrapping up, but for many, the journey to homeownership is just beginning.

For more than 20 years, Marie Shelton rented the same three-bedroom house in Charleston, West Virginia. Today, she owns it.

“I raised my kids in this house. Grandkids too,” she said. It’s just blocks from her office at the West Virginia Department of Transportation, with a big backyard and multiple fireplaces that she decorates for Christmas and in the fall.

Shelton’s path to homeownership started with an ultimatum: Her landlord had decided to sell the place that she called home. If she didn’t buy it, the landlord said, she would have to move. 

NeighborWorks® America welcomed leaders from across its nearly 250-member network to Washington, D.C., last week, for its annual Executive Symposium. The gathering gave leaders – and, for the first time in person, board members – a chance to connect, to innovate, and to talk about solutions for the nation’s housing crisis.

This year, about 220 network leaders and 120 board members joined in the event. The theme was Collective Leadership: Building Strength for Today & Tomorrow!

Marcia Erickson grew up on a cattle farm in rural South Dakota where neighbors knew and took care of one another. If one neighbor fell ill or got hurt when it was time to bring in the corn, the others were ready to help. “The crops can’t wait,” Erickson said.  

When the property tax bill arrives, it is more than just a number. For some residents, that envelope signals the start of impossible choices: food or housing? Medication or mortgage?