The Refugee Hack Summit of 2017 gave my colleagues at Moment and myself an opportunity to do a design jam with refugees. We had the opportunity to talk with refugees, experts from resettlement agencies, and HIAS - to identify core pain points.

If you’ve lived in America your whole life, you may feel like you have a pretty good grasp on our confusing credit-building system. But to a newcomer, our concept of credit—including what it means to build it—may be significantly different than what they’re familiar with. Credit history in the US has far-reaching implications. It determines things like the loans you could qualify for—including housing, car, or small business loans—and the interest rate you’ll pay. But without the proper tools and guidance, refugees may end up making decisions that negatively impact their credit score from the start, inadvertently trapping them in a cycle of debt.

We were a pretty big dedicated team. In hindsight, it would’ve been great to socialize with other teams more. In the end we were the winning team amongst 13. Sam Szerlip and myself documented our process and experience on Moment’s blog..

Check it out!