In recent years, journalists have told the stories of families having to erase evidence of their Blackness so that their homes are appraised at similar amounts as their White neighbors. These accounts epitomize the broader trends of racial inequality in home values recently documented by scholars.

Yet, previous examinations of racial inequality in home values have not had access to appraisals themselves. This changed on Monday, October 24, 2022 when the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) released the Uniform Appraisal Dataset (UAD) Aggregate Statistics, which includes more than 47 million appraisal reports gathered from licensed appraisers between 2013 and the second quarter of 2022. 

“Appraised” uses this novel UAD data to evaluate neighborhood racial inequality in appraised values. Among other results, we find that neighborhood racial inequality in appraised values grew by 75% in the past decade and that the COVID-19 pandemic and its associated monetary policy further exacerbated this inequity.

Racial inequality in home values directly contributes to persistent racial wealth gaps and residential segregation, which in turn influences racial inequalities in health, income, and educational outcomes. Home value inequalities are the result of appraisal practices that elevate White spaces as the most valuable. Addressing the increasing inequalities requires altering appraising practices and rectifying past injustices.