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Dwelling House Savings & Loan Association is a federally insured savings and loan institution that has a commitment to
community.
Chartered in July, 1890 in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania as Dwelling House Building and Loan Association (DHBLA), and renamed Dwelling House Savings and Loan Association in 1957, we have always given extra effort for those who use our services.
Dwelling House Savings and Loan exists to improve the home ownership and home rehabilitation opportunities, primarily in urban
areas of Pittsburgh. We strive to help the total community. The "marginal loans" that we make require extra time in terms of educating and counseling people. We do this because we care;
we do this because it needs to be done, and we do this because we obey God's command to help the poor.
We approach our customer with respect through encouragement, and we provide patient financial counseling.
Dwelling House has made hundreds of loans to families trying to get their first home. We take the extra care and extra
risk to help individuals that too often are turned away from "corporate banks." We are the community, and we recognize that everyone should have the opportunity to be a productive part of their
community. We want to make your mortgage loan.
In 1957, Director Robert R. Lavelle, an African-American Realtor in Pittsburgh, PA's Hill District, entered the offices of
DHB&LA to attain a loan for one of his clients on a nearby property. He didn't get the loan for his client because DHB&LA did not have enough liquidity to meet the demand for savings withdrawals.
It was being liquidated by the State.
Mr. Lavelle, realizing the resource a viable savings and loan association could be to the community, made some suggestions to
the existing management on revitalizing the DHB&LA.
The Board of Directors voted to make Robert R. Lavelle a director, and to move the office of the DHB&LA adjacent to the office of Lavelle Real Estate, so Mr. Lavelle could run the DHB&LA while running his real estate business.
Today, Dwelling House seeks to make mortgages, both traditional "good" mortgages, and higher risk mortgages. Since 1970,
Dwelling House has made over a thousand mortgages, over eighty percent to African-Americans.
Partly as a result of Dwelling House's' efforts, home ownership has risen from fourteen percent in 1960 to over forty percent today.
Read the entire history
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