Postrecession, the asset-building movement continues to gain momentum across the country. Individuals and families pursue wealth-building strategies based on such time-honored principles as budget to save, save to invest, credit building, controlling debt and protecting wealth once it has been...

Building and maintaining financial security is increasingly difficult for a growing portion of American households. Wealth is less prevalent in middle-class households and increasing among the already well-to-do. At the same time, poverty is growing and concentrating disproportionately among the...

Leigh Tivol, senior program manager with the Corporation for Enterprise Development (CFED) in Washington, D.C., presented the national perspective on the asset-building movement at the RAISE Texas Action Summit in April.>

What began several years ago as a network of matched savings programs to encourage low-income Texans to save has blossomed into a statewide, comprehensive asset-building movement now known as RAISE Texas.

In 1997 Foundation Communities in Austin, Texas, in partnership with Compass Bank, began offering Individual Development Accounts (IDAs) to residents of its affordable, multifamily housing developments. Today, the program has 137 IDA account holders, and participant savings and matched funds...

A unique partnership between Unity One Federal Credit Union and Fort Worth's Washington Heights Elementary School created a "Kids Bank" that encourages savings and teaches children valuable financial skills that will benefit them for a lifetime.

Low-income residents in New Mexico now have more incentive than ever to save for a home, an education or their own business. In the 2006 legislative session, the state provided $1.5 million to fund the Individual Development Account Act that passed in 2003.