The Blubber

Per Tech Crunch

Amid employees' struggles with buying property, Amazon has provided a solution that lets employees use their vested equity as collateral to buy a home. The retailer achieved this through a partnership with Better.com, an online mortgage lender.

This comes at a time when housing has reached an almost four-decade-high unaffordable level, especially for first-time buyers. It was calculated that first-time buyers would earn up to $90,000 in 2022.

Now, Amazon employees have the option to help improve their chances of getting a loan for buying their house. Instead of coming up with the typical down payment, employees can use their vested equity as collateral to get a downpayment for their home purchase.

This feature will first be available for Amazon employees in New York, Florida, and Washington State, with other states to potentially follow. Better.com notes that what makes this feature unique is that users don't need to sell their shares to finance their homes.

The program was called Equity Unlocker, launched by Better.com, which is even available for former Amazon employees that still had vested equity. This means employees that were laid off but had vested equity are still eligible to use the program.

As highlighted by the WSJ, Better.com would charge 0.25 to 2.5% higher than the market rate for pledged employee stocks. This, however, depends on the structure of the down payment.

Amazon spokesperson Brad Glasser shared how employees can access their programs on the first day they are employed.

Glasser: "Eligible employees can access these benefits starting on the first day of their employment with us, regardless of role or location.”

Recently, Amazon employees shared their sentiments regarding the company's return-to-office policy. Workers created a Slack channel with 5,000 employees signing a petition.

See flow at unusualwhales.com/flow.

Other News:

• Housing is now at almost four-decade-high unaffordable levels, with first-time buyers needing to earn as much as $90,000 in 2022
• Amazon, $AMZN, employees express dismay, anger about sudden return-to-office policy

Resources:

Tech Crunch

The Wall Street Journal