One of the country’s biggest mortgage providers turned down nearly half of the refinance applications sent in by Black homeowners while approving almost three-quarters of those sent in by white applicants in 2020.
According to a Bloomberg News analysis, Wells Fargo fell well below industry averages when it came to lowering interest rates through a home refinance to African-Americans, who were approved 71 percent of the time by all other lenders. Wells Fargo’s 47 percent approval rate gave it the worst record among major lenders when considering refinancings for Black homeowners.
Sifting through the information made available via the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act, which included data for 8 million completed applications to refinance conventional loans in 2020, Bloomberg found Wells Fargo was more sparing when it came to approving refinances overall: it okayed 72 percent of requests from white homeowners vs. an 87 percent approval by all other lenders; 67 percent to Asian lenders vs. 85 percent; and 53 percent to Hispanic lenders vs. 79 percent.
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