Black couple sends white friend as dummy owner, sees property value go up by half million dollars

An African American couple has settled a lawsuit with a real estate appraiser who they had accused of undervaluing their property because of their race. The couple did an experiment in which it was apparent that they had been discriminated against.

Tenisha Tate-Austin and Paul Austin's house in suburban San Francisco was valued at nearly 1 million dollars in 2020. But when a white friend posed as the home-owner and the appraisal was carried out again by a different firm, it was valued at $1.5 million.

The couple purchased their house for $550,000 in 2016 in San Francisco suburb of Marin City. When interest rates hit historic low in 2020, the couple decided to refinance their mortgage. In 2020, the appraiser valued the home at $995,000.

The couple then tried an experiment, a white friend of theirs posed as the home-owner and approached another appraising firm.The house was then valued at $1.5 million.

The duo then sued the initial appraisal company under Fair Housing Act, the federal law which prohibits discrimination when it comes to homebuying in the US.

In order to carry out the experiment, the couple 'white-washed' their home. This is a term used when an African-American couple removes all signs of a house having been previously inhabited by people of their race.

"You feel a sense of relief like, 'I told you.' Then you just feel a sense of sadness," said Tate-Austin as she commented on the valuation experiment in 2021. She was quoted by the CBS News.

"We had to do what we had to do in order to have our house appraised for what it should have appraised for from the start."

"I mean, it's the financial impact, but it's the emotional impact. It's the feeling every day like, the tax of being African-American in this country, like you don't know, it's a coin toss."

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