http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/4268853.html

Oct. 18, 2006, 3:38PM
Immigrants in Texas to send $5.2 billion home

By JENALIA MORENO
Copyright 2006 Houston Chronicle

Latin American immigrants in Texas will send $5.2 billion back home to their relatives this year, ranking second only to California in a state-by-state breakdown released today by the Inter-American Development Bank's Multilateral Investment Fund.

Remittances from Texas will soar by 64 percent this year compared to in 2004, surpassing the national increase of 51 percent, the study found.

The Washington, D.C.-based fund estimates that the 12.6 million Latin American immigrants living in the United States will send $45.3 billion home this year.

These cash flows have captured the attention of U.S. and Mexican businesses in the last few years, with banks trying to tap into that market by offering money wiring services. And in Houston, furniture, cement and real estate companies offer immigrants here the chance to pay for sofas, construction materials and new homes in Mexico and Central America.

More people are sending cash home because "it is now becoming an expectation," said Sergio Bendixen of Bendixen and Associates. For this study, he conducted 2,511 telephone interviews with Latino immigrants and focus groups in both the U.S. and Latin America. "People almost feel obligated to do so."

Advertisements remind Latinos to send cash or gifts, such as appliances, home to relatives for holidays, such as Mother's Day, he said.

Latino immigrants regularly call relatives back home and know when someone is in financial straits or needs money for a special occasion, Bendixen said.

"Because of this constant communication, they have the pressure to send money," he said.

Indeed, Mexican immigrant Juan Torres said he calls his mother every two days and if his relatives are having a problem, "then I'll send money for medicine or for a doctor."

The study also found that immigrants from Mexico, Central America and South America also contribute to the economy inside the United States.

Latin American immigrants have more than $500 billion in buying power and send about 10 percent of their earnings home to relatives, according to the study. In Texas, immigrants contribute about $52.8 billion to the local economy, according to the study.

"These remittance families are contributing to two countries," said Donald Terry, manager of the fund, dubbing immigrants "transnational families."

But other groups view these cash transfers as an example of immigrants living in the U.S. simply to work instead of fully integrating here.

"It represents a one foot in, a one foot out sensibility on the part of immigrants," said John Keeley, spokesman for the Center for Immigration Studies, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank that supports tougher immigration laws.

Immigrants living in California will send about $13.2 billion this year to Latin America, making it the only state with higher remittances than Texas.

And this year, Texas will overtake New York, which ranked second on the list the last time this study was conducted in 2004. New York ranks third, with $3.7 billion bound for Latin America, because some immigrants from the state moved to nearby New Jersey, Bendixen said.

The study has a margin of error of plus or minus two percentage points.

Texas also has twice as many immigrants than New York with the Lone Star state's immigrant population growing because of its proximity to Latin America and job opportunities in everything from construction workers to restaurant cooks, Bendixen said.

"There's been a huge influx in the last five years," Bendixen said, because of "a combination of difficult times in Latin America and a booming U.S. economy."

More than half of Latin Americans who sent money abroad did not have a full-time job in their home countries, the study found. But once they touched U.S. soil, about half found a job within a month, earning an average monthly salary of $900.

"They need the jobs. We need the workers in the U.S.," Terry said. "That's what drives immigration in the U.S. and that's what drives remittances."

jenalia.moreno@chron.com