Black Wealth Builder’s Fund: Building Community Equity–Sun, 6/14, 11:45 am | Fellowship Hall

Come and hear Jim Becker, the CEO of RCF Connects (they administer the BWBF) and Astrid Heim, a recipient of a BWBF home loan, discuss the impact of the Black Wealth Builder’s Fund on our community.  To date, Epworth has raised $185,000 for the BWBF, enabling 10 Black families to purchase their first home. So far, the fund as a whole has dispersed $988,500 in 57 loans to Black first-time homebuyers primarily in Alameda and Contra Costa counties.

Jim Becker joined the Richmond Community Foundation in 2005, becoming its President and CEO in 2014. Since joining RCF, Mr. Becker became co-chair of the Ensuring Opportunity Campaign to End Poverty in Contra Costa County. In 2016, the Richmond Community Foundation received the Foundation of the Year award from the East Bay Leadership Council. In 2023, RCF was a finalist in the National Housing Affordability Challenge in Washington, DC, for this work and in 2025, RCF was recognized as the Nonprofit of the Year by the City of Antioch, CA, received the Charles F. McGlashan Award and also the East Bay EDA Innovation Award.

Astrid Heim, an East Bay resident and Clinical Research Coordinator at Kaiser Permanente, wanted to buy a home to establish a lasting financial foundation. In spite of the statistics of low Black home ownership, she remained hopeful, even though she was pursuing this dream alone.  Once her real estate agent introduced her to Richmond Neighborhood Housing Services' pre-purchase homebuyer program, she believed she finally had the support needed to navigate the Bay Area's tough housing market. And so, in addition to down payment assistance, the Black Wealth Builder’s Fund and its partner organizations provided another type of inheritance: an education. The financial literacy one needs to purchase a large asset, like a home, is often not passed down from generation to generation. “ It’s not easy being a Black person living in the Bay Area, where often it feels like we are deliberately being pushed out. The support I received from programs like the Black Wealth Builder’s Fund reinforced that there is real support for people like me who are determined to establish and maintain roots in one of the greatest regions on Earth!” said Heim. In 2022, Heim secured a zero-interest loan from the Black Wealth Builder’s Fund and purchased a three-bedroom condominium.