Warren Buffet’s housing firm exploits minorities: report

Clayton Homes, a manufacturer and retailer of modular homes owned by billionaire Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway, steers homebuyers to more expensive mortgages offered by a Berkshire-owned lender, a move illegal under federal law, according to a recently published investigative report.
The lender, Vanderbilt Mortgages, charges minority buyers more for mortgages than white buyers earning less, the 5,000-word story alleges.
In addition, Clayton employees 🐻regularly use racially charged language to describe black managers or minority customers, the story claims — citing interviews with more than 280 customers, employees and experts, including some Clayton insiders who said they were appalled by the company’s practices.

In marketing homes in and around minority areas of Texas, Clayton uses “meticulous demographic analysis and targeted sales promotions” — including Spanish-language ads and Spanish-speaking sales persons — to woo buyers, the story claims.
But when these customers decide to buy a home, it was Clayton’s practice not to provide Spanish-speaking customers with translated loan documents or interpreters at closing — even after employees at headquarters complained that too many customers were being misled about loan terms, the story, alleges.
Clayton expa🍸nded its minority custܫomer base to 31 percent of all its loans from 22 percent in 2008, according to the report.

Clayton, in a statement, accused the reporters of “activism masquerading as journalism” and said, “We categorically and adamantly deny discriminating against customers or team members based on race or ethnicity.”
For two specific categories of loans, the company said, minorities pay the same or slightly lower interest rate♐s than whites.