Home Help Program

About the Program

Category: Community and Economic Development (Best in Category)

Year: 2010

Prince William County, which has the highest foreclosure rate in the Commonwealth of Virginia, successfully implemented an innovative program to help bolster its flagging real estate market and simultaneously provide employee workforce housing incentives—all at no cost to tax payers. The initiative began on December 18, 2008, when the Board of Supervisors unanimously endorsed the county’s Home Help Program. The Home Help Program was designed to provide an incentive for home ownership for employees renting or living outside the county, while concurrently reducing the volume of vacant, foreclosed and for-sale properties in the county. It is a public private partnership made possible, in part, by investing a portion of the county’s investment portfolio in collateralized certificates of deposits with SunTrust Bank, the county’s current banking services provider. As part of the program, SunTrust Bank will provide benefits to Prince William County employees that include credits that can be used for interest rate reductions and/or closing costs. The remarkable part of this effort is that it attacks two serious dilemmas facing the county, while having zero budget impact. This project exemplifies the way collaboration and public-private partnership can result in an innovative program to address multiple community problems at no cost to the taxpayer and can be modeled in local governments throughout the nation.