I still remember going to view my first prospective property. The lack of eye contact from the estate agent, the assurance that the property was ‘a bit pricey’, the area ‘too quiet’ for me. I asked myself, is stepping through the threshold of a property an audacious act? An overreach beyond my place? Was the very notion of a Black woman holding the keys to a home an affront to the status quo? 

My parents were homeowners. As were my grandparents. The Windrush generation was built on agency. When my grandfather arrived here from Guyana in 1959, he purchased a three storey house in Hackney within two years of his arrival. His generation became the biggest occupational home owners in Britain, and many became the landlords of multiple properties.

So, when I saw a recent headline revealing that Black women are being evicted at disproportionate rates, my heart sank. How is it possible that housing, a fundamental cornerstone of stability and belonging, has become yet another arena in which Black women are made to feel unworthy?