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To address a shrinking but still substantial racial wealth gap, Massachusetts’ should expand programs that encourage developers to build home ownership condominiums, a Boston Foundation analysis has concluded.

The report released this week spotlights the powerful role of real estate in wealth creation, and the lingering disparities between home ownership in Greater Boston. Only 40 percent of 35-and-over Black households in Greater Boston own a home, compared with 73 percent of white households, the foundation noted in its “Long Road Home” report.

Demand far exceeds the supply of housing supported by the Commonwealth Builder program, said Kelly Harrington, a senior research manager for the Boston Foundation. One developer recently 1,900 applications for a 38-unit project that received funding from the program.

“It is essential that we continue to build both market-rate and income-restricted home ownership opportunities,” Harrington said at a forum Wednesday to discuss the report’s recommendations. “We can do that by continue to invest in programs like the Commonwealth Builder and tax credit programs that subsidize construction of affordable developments, through zoning reform that legalizes more forms of market-rate home ownership opportunities, and more public investment in owner-occupied developments in Gateway Cities and lower-cost markets.”

The four-year-old Commonwealth Builder program was created under the Baker administration to provide subsidies to developers who include at least 25 percent income-restricted units in condo projects. Projects in Boston and 28 economically-challenged communities are eligible to participate.

The program has allocated funding for 1,685 housing units scheduled to be built in the next two years and has a cost of $220,000 per unit in state subsidies.

“Commonwealth Builder does have the distinction of being a rare program that directly addresses the fundamental issue of housing supply constraints,” the report states.

Additionally, 54-year-old Chapter 40B law enables developers including at least 20 percent income-restricted units to override local zoning in towns with an undersupply of affordable housing. But the program allows communities to reserve affordable units for existing residents, perpetuating wealth disparities, the foundation report said.

The report also calls for expansion of buyer-targeted programs to increase access to home ownership, including more race-based homeownership programs and increased funding for direct financial assistance to first-time homebuyers.

It points to one successful model that could be expanded in MassDREAMS, a down payment assistance program created in 2021 using federal ARPA funding that applied to 21 communities hit hardest by the COVID-19 pandemic. An infusion of state funding would enable the program to be expanded across Massachusetts and help create generational wealth transfer, the report said.

It also recommends expansion of state-sponsored mortgage programs that partner with private financial institutions and provide subsidies for homebuyers, such as MassHousing’s Workforce Advantage program and Massachusetts Housing Partnership’s ONE Mortgage program, which provides low-down payment loans for first-time buyers.