Baltimore Finds Subprime Crisis Snags Women

By JOHN LELAND

BALTIMORE — At Vixxen Hair Salon, the main topic of conversation has always been money. But since last August, Anjanette Booker, the owner, has noticed a new focus. “Now it’s money and foreclosures,” Miss Booker said.

The Vixxen salon, along with the nearby salon Hair Vysions, is one of the informal social centers for the Belair-Edison neighborhood, a community of brick row houses that have in recent years been bought largely by single black women with children.

For each of the last four years, more than half of the foreclosures in this neighborhood have been homes owned primarily by women, according to an analysis of public records by the Reinvestment Fund, a nonprofit community development organization.