Laura Arce
Laura Arce is Senior Vice President for Economic Initiatives at UnidosUS. Laura is the architect and leader of the Home Ownership Means Equity (HOME) Initiative, a multi-year movement to transform the economic trajectory of Latinos through homeownership. The HOME Initiative leverages policy, research, communications, and community-based strategies to influence systemic change to enable the creation of four million new Latino homeowners between 2020 and 2030.
Previously, Laura was Senior Vice President at Wells Fargo & Co. where she led strategic efforts to advance public policies on consumer banking, consumer and home lending, and community reinvestment.
Prior to joining Wells Fargo in 2015, Laura was Senior Policy Analyst at the Federal Housing Finance Agency where she oversaw reforms to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac policies and products during the Great Recession. During her tenure at FHFA, Laura was awarded the Distinguished Service Award and selected as an Excellence in Government Fellow.
Laura has held senior positions in the private, nonprofit, and public sectors, including on Capitol Hill and at UnidosUS, then known as the National Council of La Raza (NCLR). She successfully authored the certification application for the Raza Development Fund, the first CDFI sponsored by a civil rights organization, and secured federal funding to establish a national network of housing counseling agencies focused on increasing the Latino homeownership rate. Laura is a Board Member of the Center for Responsible Lending. She also serves on the Fannie Mae Affordable Housing Advisory Committee and the National Housing Conference’s National Advisory Council.
Laura is a first-generation American and a second-generation graduate of the University of California at Berkeley. She holds a master’s degree in urban planning from Rutgers University where she was a Community Development Fellow.
Recent media engagements and commentary:
- Latino Homeownership: Research, Insights, and Solutions— Research symposium recording (Jan. 30, 2025)
- Community-based solutions provide the opportunity to finally own a home — Albuquerque Journal op-ed (Nov. 17, 2024)
- Congress should invest in the economic future of Latino homeowners — American Banker (Oct. 22, 2024)
- She moved in search of affordable housing and ended up with more political power. Now what? — The 19th (Oct. 11, 2024)