One of my favorite works of U.S. Catholic history is John McGreevy’s book Parish Boundaries, in which McGreevy argues that racial conflicts in the urban industrial north were quite pitched in Catholic neighborhoods–conflict over neighborhood integration more than anything else. McGreevy traces these struggles over the neighborhood back to a high rate of Catholic home ownership, and the way in which the Catholic theology encouraged followers to invest the physical space of the parish and surround community with sacramental significance. So, when Protestants and Jews began an exodus to the suburbs in the post-WWII period, Catholics stayed and eventually came into direct conflict with their increasingly numerous African American neighbors.
Dave Roediger makes a related argument in his great new book, Working Toward Whiteness. Basically, he points to the importance of home ownership and labor organizations for the process by which racially in-between peoples — new immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe — were accepted into whiteness during the 1930s. Dave’s smart and everyone should read the book.
This rehearsal of the McGreevy and Roediger material is just a round-about way of saying that all of this homeownership and sacramental worldview stuff is a part of my scholarly work, and soon, hopefully, part of my personal experience — okay, so I already have the sacramental worldview thing down, but property buying is new and pretty complicated….
Today my brother James, who sells real estate at Coakley Realty, and I met with the sales agent at my apartment complex to get the scoop on the upcoming conversion to condos. I figured, given the going contracts in the area, I could swing buying my place. I’m notorious for not liking to move–in seven years of graduate school I only moved once, and that was because my apartment flooded. So, I thought I’d take the tax benefits and avoid the shopping and moving hassle in this deal. Boy, was I wrong!! Needless to say, the quoted rate for my unrenovated, nineteen year old apartment, was out of control. And the man who delivered this news was as close to the stereotype of a used car salesman as I’ve ever met in person–as if the new Japanese garden is enough to make up for the 35K difference in price.
Now, even though I’m definitely not buying the place I’m in, I have to embark upon the mission of shopping AND moving, whether I succeed in buying a place or whether I just move to another rental. So much for the American Dream… four months and counting.
I’m so sorry about the condo collapse! What a bummer.
Other thoughts on homeownership are in George Sanchez’s Becoming Mexican American. He found that homeownership for Mexicans was emotional and a cultural statement of permanence in the US. However, it did not equate to mobility out of working classes. I wonder if connections to parishes also factored into this equation. I think Thernstrom studied the Irish in MA to look at mobility, and found that homeowners spent more money on housing than renters.
In today’s DC housing market, it might not be so bad to rent. Then you can still go out and do fun things and not be financially strapped to a condo.
Dunno, just some thoughts.