How HCLF helps rebuild
Hartford Neighborhoods:
HCLF’s Small Business Development Initiative is
unique in that we partner our funds with capital from local
banks, leveraging our own capital to the maximum extent
possible to enable us to help more businesses. As a result,
commercial banks, incented by the Community Reinvestment
Act, have embraced HCLF as a lending partner. HCLF helps
local banks both find and make loans they typically would
not make on their own. In HCLF’s eight year history, more
than 95% of its loans have been ‘participation loans’, in
which HCLF has joined its capital with a co-lender.
Through the Small Business Development Initiative the
Hartford Community Loan Fund has facilitated over $15
million in loans to nearly 60 small businesses in south
Hartford since its founding as the Hartford Community Loan Fund
in 1997. HCLF’s total investment in these loans has been
approximately $5 million. HCLF loans have resulted in the
creation of over 350 jobs, mostly to Hartford residents.
Participating in loans originated by local banks has
facilitated two other unique benefits to HCLF: HCLF’s
overhead costs are reduced, and our default rate has
historically been lower than that of our peer lending group.
The HCLF program has been highlighted in the Harvard
Business Review as a model public/private partnership. Learn
more about our business loans.
Since the creation of our Home Improvement Loan Program
in 1998, we’ve provided over $1,000,000 in rehab loans,
resulting in improvements to more than 150 housing units in
our original south Hartford investment area, with an average
loan size of $20,000. HCLF’s home improvement loans are now
available citywide. Learn more
about our home improvement loans.
In 2006 HCLF introduced our Construction / Rehab loan,
providing funding for the rehab of substantially blighted or
deteriorating residential or mixed use properties. Through
this program, HCLF provides affordable financing to
developers and contractors rehabilitating properties in the
City of Hartford. Learn more
about our construction / rehab loans.
HCLF was designated by the US Department of the Treasury as
a Community Development Financial Institution ("CDFI") in
July 2002 and as a Community Development Entity (“CDE”) in
December 2004. HCLF is the only CDFI exclusively serving
Hartford. CDFIs are financial intermediaries which
specialize in servicing economically distressed and
underserved markets. CDEs are also financial intermediaries
established to make and receive investments in low-income
communities under the US Department of the Treasury’s New
Markets Tax Credit program.
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