Laura Ingalls Wilder once said that “Home is the nicest word there is.” At the Minnesota Homeownership Center, we couldn’t agree more. For the last 20 years, the Center has remained committed to one goal: making sustainable, affordable homeownership attainable for Minnesota families and communities.

The Center has persistently underscored the need for programs and services that offer potential buyers non-biased, trustworthy information to help them make good decisions about home buying. In addition to supporting our Homeownership Advisors Network so that more than 20 non-profit, governmental and tribal organizations could continue to offer our flagship homebuyer education program, Home Stretch, in 2012 the Center launched a first of its kind interactive online homebuyer education course known as Framework™. Now, both online and in-person, buyers learn how to seek out reliable lenders and REALTORS®; the responsibilities of homeownership; and how to plan financially for achieving and sustaining their home.

The number of homes lost to foreclosure in 2012 reached its lowest point since 2006, but thousands of Minnesota families still struggled. The Center continued to support our unique and critical foreclosure prevention model. Nowhere else in the country is there a centralized support model for foreclosure services delivered locally.

As we celebrate 20 years Leading Minnesota Home, we thank you for your continued partnership and support.

Mike Haley Julie Gugin President, Board of Directors Executive Director

www.hocmn.org

Minnesota Homeownership

Center

Annual Report

2012

Breaking New Ground

Home is the nicest

word there is Laura Ingalls Wilder

In pursuit of this vision, the Center recognized that the only way to ensure accessibility and flexibility while meeting the needs of today’s tech-savvy buyers, was to create an online homebuyer education workshop.

In 2012, Center formed a partnership with the Housing Partnership Network to develop and launch Framework™, the most comprehensive online homebuyer educational tool available anywhere in the country.

Framework™ incorporates the most advanced best practices for online adult learning and engages users via a fun and personalized learning experience. Framework’s™ ‘graphic novel’ theme is visually appealling, intuitive and easily allows homebuyers to access information and complete the course at their own pace.

This innovative approach to homebuyer education is once again helping the Center break ground in Minnesota.

Through Framework™:

• We’ve customized the learning experience. Buyers can expand on content, review sections they find challenging more than once, and complete sessions at their convenience.

www.hocmn.org

1993. Jurassic Park was the country’s top movie and the now-ubiquitous “Got Milk?” ad campaign was first launched by the California Milk Board. Here in Minnesota, a group of forward-thinking affordable housing advocates, educators, real estate & lending professionals and community members were breaking new ground in the field of homeownership education and counseling by founding the Minnesota Homeownership Center.

Over the years, the Center continued to break new ground by unifying homebuyer education and counseling under a single certified curriculum and counseling model known as Home Stretch. We were one of the first organizations in the country to establish protocols and procedures for foreclosure prevention counseling and even established a refinance counseling model that is now legislatively required when holders of certain affordable mortgages would like to obtain a refinance.

Our award-winning Home Stretch curriculum has demonstrated the effectiveness of pre-purchase education in positively affecting sustainable homeownership. Given the housing crisis of the last few years, it’s abundantly clear that a significant number of foreclosures could have been prevented had more homebuyers and industry professionals recognized the unique advantages of homebuyer education taught by a trusted, unbiased source.

For several years the Center recognized the need to be able to effectively reach more homebuyers before they make the decisions that ultimately will affect their success as homeowners.

Breaking new ground to help

Minnesota households become or remain

successful homeowners and building

stronger communities across the state

is what we do.

www.FrameworkHomeOwnership.org

I’ve recommended the Center’s

services to hundreds of real estate

agents and consumers. They seem

to have answers for almost every

situation.

- A. Dickinson, Realtor

www.hocmn.org

The Minnesota Homeownership Center’s mission is to promote and advancesuccessful homeownership in Minnesota.

• We’re now better able to reach Minnesota’s rural communities, households with disabilities, and families with time and schedule constraints.

• Most importantly, we’ve greatly expanded the Center’s ability to reach new buyers. Currently in Minnesota, about 20% of first-time homebuyers participate in Home Stretch classes every year. That means 80% of the first-time homebuyer market is not taking advantage of the benefits of homebuyer education.

As we celebrate the Center’s 20 years of innovation in homeownership education, we will continue to strive to find new

and ground-breaking ways to support our mission of successful, sustainable homeownership for all Minnesota families in our next 20 years.

Tawana’s StoryFor years, Tawana and her family were moving from one unstable rental environment to another. Then last year, she again found herself being forced to move out of the home she was renting when the property was sold. Running out of time and frantically trying to find an affordable rental large enough for her and her four children, a ‘wrong number’ dramatically changed the direction of her life.

I couldn’t have done it on

my own… they cared.- Tawana, New Homeowner

Thinking she was calling an ad for a four-bedroom rental property, Tawana inadvertently called MCASA, a member of the Center’s Homeownership Advisor Network. MCASA had recently bought and rehabbed a previously foreclosed property and were looking to sell it to a low- to moderate-income buyer to help stabilize both the community and the family’s housing situation.

With the assistance of a Homeownership Advisor and with her Home Stretch certificate in her hand, Tawana was able to avoid becoming homeless by accessing down payment assistance and other programs to purchase her first home.

Hear more about her story, in her own words, here: http://bit.ly/10Wqeoq.

2012 Financial Statement

Statement of Financial Position

Current assets Cash and cash equivalents $ 2,520,007 Contributions and grants receivable 420,375 Prepaid expenses 13,396 Security deposit 700 Inventory 16,689

Total current assets 2,971,167

Noncurrent assets Property and equipment - net 49,016 Investment in Framework LLC joint venture 263,504

Total noncurrent assets 312,520

Total assets 3,283,687

Liabilities and net assets Current liabilities:

Accounts payable 273,073 Due to HECAT 280,000 Accrued expenses 51,575 Funds held for others 13,637 Capital lease - short term 1,886

Total current liabilities 620,171

Non-current liabilities:

Capital lease - long term -

Total liabilities 620,171

Net assets: Unrestricted:

Undesignated 1,728,974 Board designated: Foreclosure prevention loan pool 153,530 Reserves 251,723 Total board designated 405,253 Total unrestricted 2,134,227

Temporarily restricted 529,289

Total net assets 2,663,516

Total liabilities and net assets 3,283,687

Statement of Activities

Support and revenue Contributions $ 732,685 Grants and contracts 1,268,701 Loan repayments 6,000 Sales of workshop manuals 31,652 In-kind contribution 64,549 Gain on investment in Framework joint venture 135,586Interest 4,872 Other 43,126

Total support and revenue 2,287,171 Expenses Program services 1,958,949 Management and general 176,755 Fundraising 63,362

Total expenses 2,199,066

Change in net assets 88,105

Net assets - beginning of year 2,575,411

Net assets - end of year 2,663,516

Grants & Contracts

55.5%Contributions

32.0%

Other12.5%

Revenue

Fundraising3%

Program Delivery94%

Administration8%

Expenses

www.hocmn.org

2012 Financial Support

City of Minneapolis, Community Planning and Economic Development

Hennepin County

The McKnight Foundation

Minnesota Housing

Otto Bremer Foundation

U.S. Bancorp Foundation and U.S. Bank

USDA Rural Development

Wells Fargo

City of St. Paul Planning and Economic Development

Fannie Mae Foundation

Minnesota Department of Commerce

Target Foundation

Thrivent Financial for Lutherans Foundation

Ameriprise Financial

Bank of America Charitable Foundation

BMO Harris Bank

Family Housing Fund

Greater Minnesota Housing Fund

Housing Partnership Network

Jay and Rose Phillips Family Foundation of Minnesota

TCF Foundation

Western National Mutual Insurance Company

Bank of the West

Coldwell Banker Burnet

Thrivent Bank

Valspar Foundation

Board of Directors

Officers

President Michael Haley, Minnesota Housing

Vice President Vicki Shipley, US Bank

Treasurer David Lindstrom, BMO Harris Bank

Secretary David Eide, Western National Mutual Insurance Company

MembersJill Aleshire, Thrivent Financial Bank

Marilyn Bruin, University of Minnesota

Robyn Bipes, Greater Minnesota Housing Fund

Cherie Shoquist, City of Minneapolis, Community Planning and Economic Development

Joe Collins, City of Saint Paul, Planning and Economic Development

Darielle Dannen, Metropolitan Consortium of Community Developers

Jim Erchul, Dayton’s Bluff Neighborhood Housing Services

Tom Fulton, Family Housing Fund

Muffie Gabler, Wells Fargo Bank*

Karen Gajeski, Bremer Bank

Chris Galler, Minnesota Association of REALTORS®

Jacqueline King, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis

Repa Mekha, Nexus Community Partners

Robin Peterson, Coldwell Banker Burnet

Elfric Porte, City of Minneapolis Community Planning and Economic Development*

Bill Sarvela, TCF National Bank

Andy Schlack, Greater Minnesota Housing Fund*

Mary Thompson, Headwaters Regional Development Commission

(Representing Minnesota Homeownership Center’s Advisory Council)

Stephanie Vergin, USDA Rural Development

David Wiese, Wells Fargo Bank

* Term ended prior to year end, 2012

www.hocmn.org www.hocmn.org

< $

10,0

00

Julie J. GuginTom W. HodnefieldNancy E. HostetlerMary L. JahnkeJacqueline KingAna B. MorenoBill SarvelaPatty SchulzStephen SeidelJeff Strand

$10

0,00

0 +

$50

,000

to

99,

000

$10

,000

to

49,

000

KE

YS

ton

e D

on

ors

Jill M. AleshireThomas F. AlexanderDaniel BallintineRobyn BipesRobert ChraneStephen F. DevereuxMolly T. EichtenBrett L. FeldmanTom FultonMuffie GablerShirley Gugin