 in urban housing today. This fall, we are hosting a series of informal and open conversations on housing, race, racism, and whiteness. Each session focuses on a specific theme with an expert practitioner as part of our efforts explicitly integrate an anti-racist agenda into our current lines of work. Today, we are joined by Cecily King from the MS-Ride class of 2015 and founder and managing partner of Kipling Development. Cecily is our real estate developer consultant focused on residential development opportunities in Detroit, Michigan, and New Jersey urban centers. During the last five years of her career, she has been involved in cultivating $500 million of real estate development projects in Detroit and was appointed as a development director for the city of Detroit's Housing and Revitalization Department. In 2018, Cecily launched her own real estate development and consulting practice. As a consultant, she specializes in financial analysis, underwriting, and large-scale development strategies. As a developer, she primarily focuses on residential development, pursuing both new construction and value-add rehab opportunities with an emphasis on creating opportunities for ownership. Cecily, thank you for joining us today and we look forward to learning more about your work. Thanks for having me. I'm excited to come back and spend some time speaking with Columbia students, maybe alumni. I see a few familiar places. Hi, Jessica, it's been forever. Yeah, so thanks for the introduction and thank you for the invitation. I was really excited to be reached out to be a part of this conversation series this fall because I think there's two things that the last five years of my work in Detroit has centered on and it's been housing and it's been raced because of the type of one, the city that I've been working in, but then two, also just myself as a Black American in real estate development and really specifically a focus on finance and just the color, the lens that I bring, I think, to the industry when I'm looking at the types of projects that I'm working with, the teams that I'm working on and people that I'm working with and for. So I'm excited to share a little bit about my work. I was going to talk about myself a little bit, but you heard a lot about me. I was curious to see what some of the makeup of you all are, where some of your interests are. I'd like to keep this as conversational as possible. I've listened to a few of these. I know some people skewed toward presenting, some people skewed toward conversation. I definitely want this to be an open dialogue, so feel free to interrupt me as questions as we go along. I want to talk about a project that I'm currently working on in Detroit. And then I also had a couple of thoughts related to, I think, my experience as a professional in the housing industry with a specific lens on affordable housing, but then how that ties to this idea of racial equity and development. I have four main ideas. I wouldn't call them necessarily gripes with the industry. I wouldn't call them issues. I think they're just discussion points. And I hope that it does turn into a conversation around some of these ideas. So what I'm going to do is share my screen. Actually, what I'll do is I'll give you a little bit about myself. If anyone who has their camera on or is interested in unmuting themselves wants to share maybe what program you're from, just so I have a sense of who I'm talking to from the various programs that you have, that'd be really helpful for me, just so I can kind of tailor some of the things I might emphasize as I go along. But like you've heard, I was MS Red class of 2015. I've spent my career, actually, I would say in real estate, just at very different sides of the table. So I actually started out as a structural engineer. My undergrad is from Princeton in civil engineering. I did a minor in urban studies. At the time, I didn't realize why I was interested in urban studies. I didn't know what I was going to do with urban studies. I thought I was going to be an engineer. I went on and did a master's in structural and started working as a structural engineer and realized that pretty quickly in my career that it wasn't the long-term career decision for me. I loved what I was doing. I always loved the built environment. I love the real estate industry, but I needed to figure out a way to have a bigger picture perspective of what's going on in the project. For me as an engineer, I wasn't satisfied with making something stand up, frankly, after decisions I've been made about what's going there, what's how it's going to look, and why it's being done. And so for me, the MSRI program was that perfect complement to the design and construction background that I had to be able to balance myself out and learn the business side of the deal table. So I went into the MSRI program specifically for two reasons. One, because I had this design background and wanted to supplement it. And then two, what I was really drawn to was the fact that there were so many adjuncts at GSAP, specifically an MSRI program, who were working in practice at the time. And so being able to get real world experience, real world interaction with people who were coming from work and were teaching a class was much less theoretical for me than some of the other programs I looked at, some of the other disciplines I was looking at. And ultimately, for me, I knew I wanted to do real estate. So it made more sense for me to do MSRED or even doing an MBA. So that's just a little bit of my personal reason why MSRED was the right fit for me. And it's something that I definitely credit this second half of my career to date with setting me up with a number of my connections, even in the work that I do in Detroit, the people I work with today. And some of the work that I'm doing now is in collaboration with some of my classmates from the MSRED program. So it's been a really formative decision for me personally and professionally to be a part of the MSRED program. I think one of the things that, so since I left MSRED, the last five years for me have been almost exclusively focused on Detroit. I was appointed as a development director for the city of Detroit's Housing and Revitalization Department right out of school. And it was interesting because I was brought in under that administration because I had private sector experience. So I'm going to talk a little bit about Detroit a little bit later. But I think what the perspective that that role gave me was unique because I don't think I would have worked in the public sector in necessarily any other city. And I obviously have landed back in the private sector. But having that understanding of what's going on in the background and on the other side of the table, if you will, has been really important in my value as a consultant for sure and in my understanding of how projects are put together as a developer. As Kipling Development, I started that in 2018 after finishing at the city. As a consultant, I have worked almost exclusively with developers who are a bit on the smaller side in their shops. And what they do is they bring me in to add capacity. So if they're not interested in building out a whole shop and hiring a ton of employees, but they're really trying to build their deal pipeline, I will come in and I will, for example, one project is a condo conversion in a historic district. And I will manage pre-development, for example, for that project. Or on the other end of the spectrum, I have, again, a friend or colleague who needed assistance building his deal pipeline. He's looking at a $65 million tower that's going to be mixed-use, pretty sure, retail at the bottom with some office hotel condo, and is looking to place some equity, is looking to do a bit of pre-development. And once that deal lands, he'll have the developer fee to hire staff. But in the interim, he doesn't want to take on the additional load. So that's been my sweet spot as a consultant over the last two, three years. So it allows me to see a lot of different types of deals. While also allowing me to also work on my own deals. So as a developer, switching hats from larger scale stuff, I really love residential. I love smaller scale. I love historic rehab. I love, or historic neighborhoods. I love there to be character. I love there to be a, just the scale for me is very important, the hominess of what I'm developing. And the attention to detail is something that's really important to me. Obviously I'm also not, I don't have the net worth to support like a large, much larger development as well. So a lot of my projects tend to be on the smaller side, but it also is like manageable for me to do projects myself, to do them in partnership with others. And it gives me a lot of flexibility. So I've been talking for a bit. I would love to understand what some of the programs are that are sitting in front of me, whether you guys are MS-Red, if you're MRC, if you're dual degree. If you are urban planning, anyone who's willing to just chime in, maybe say your name and what program you're with, just for my edification. Come on, hands up, all the best, right? Quite a few there for you, Cecilia. All right, awesome. And I saw some more people, because about 30. Okay, so I see another screen. Cool, what about dual degrees? Cool. Awesome. Maybe urban planning, and there's a lot of people. I'm like scrolling back and forth and having all the cameras on, half of them down. Historic preservation. Did I miss it? There's one I see, two maybe? I think that was two. Okay, cool. So this is a good mix. Okay, awesome. So I'm gonna put some slides up on the screen and talk it's a little awkward because I won't be able to see your faces. So if you have a question, either drop it in the chat or just start talking over me because that's fine with me. Okay, so let me, one, make sure I have everything where it needed to be. Cool, T-Share. And let me know if you can see this. Oops, not that bad. That was weird. Very good, yep. You guys can see that? Yep. Okay, so I have clicked through these a little bit. What I wanted to kind of start in this talk about affordable housing and racial equity is, again, I don't wanna talk all the time. So maybe if there's someone who has their, who's quick to unmute. I'd love to hear a couple of thoughts of what you think about or what your perception is when you hear the word housing. Anybody? One word. Shortage. Shortage. Okay, and I think a few notes as you guys are saying that. Protection. Protection. Community. Okay, maybe one more. Ownership. Ownership. All right, so when I say affordable housing, any first impressions, first thoughts? Real shortage. Mixed income. Cheaply made. What did you say? Cheaply made. Weightless. Okay, cool. Community center. Community center, you said? Yes. Cool, so I'm just gonna hold those thoughts for a second as I continue through this presentation. Another question, how familiar are any of you with Detroit? Out of curiosity. I am. You are. What's your context for it? I project managed development right there on the river kind of downtown called Orleans Landing. Oh yeah, yeah. Very cool. I'm actually from Toledo. Okay, it's like 45 minutes. And a lot of time in Detroit. Okay, cool. Anyone else have any connections to Detroit? I should say I am originally from New Jersey, born and raised. I've lived several different places up and down the East Coast and Detroit for the last five years. I am currently where I'm sitting right now is Northern New Jersey right outside of Newark. My family's from here. It's been an easier place to be in this weird, weird time that we're in right now for a few reasons. So just a little bit of context about me and my relationship with Detroit. So for a little bit of framing for why Detroit is so important to me in this conversation about affordable housing and racial equity. Anyone have an idea of how non-white Detroit is? I was a percentage of population. I know you know. I can make a guess but I'll wait for someone else. Anyone? That's okay. I'll just guess 75, 25. 75, 25, okay. So the answer is upwards of 85% as high as 87% black. And that's not including other non-white minorities. Any sense for how poor Detroit is as a, using median income as a measure? I know you probably, yeah. Yeah. So the median income is under $20,000. It is still one of the top 10 even with population decline since let's say even the mid-90s. It's still one of the top 10 cities in terms of size, population size in the United States. So just thinking about the magnitude of majority minority community poor economic demographic like majority poor economic demographic. But then also just as a quick comparison for you guys I asked this question but the cost of living in Detroit if you're in Manhattan and you make $100,000 to match that quality of life in Detroit you only need to make 40,000. So just for some like context on like how different a major urban city urban center in the United States can be from where you all are going to school in the context of racial equity and development and affordable housing. I wanted to set that framework for you guys for those of you who may not be as familiar with Detroit. And Detroit's an interesting story because it was not like this at its prime. It was one of the wealthiest cities in the United States. It was built on like many cities and manufacturing industry specifically the auto industry which I'm sure you guys are familiar with. It's where Henry Ford piloted his $5 a day wage. So in terms of like the idea of the American dream like everyone having a house and a driver with a car in it and the 2.5 kids or whatever the percentages you're supposed to have that was like the epitome and the representation for that idea of like I said, the American dream. And I think there's been like several compounding issues over the decades that have led to kind of where it is today. One of the most devastating for communities of color is obviously urban renewal projects which I'm sure you guys are very familiar with. There's still like large swaths of the city that have been decimated from a neighborhood perspective because of decisions that were made in terms of lack of housing because of decisions that were made during that period of time that has resulted in the, I would say white flight and money flight to the suburbs. And so you have this really interesting and then politically you have a very interesting differentiation between the city and the rest of the surrounding state. So when you're talking about public subsidies and talking about decisions being made at the state local and state local and even national government level related to housing, there's a lot of tension that's a result of some of the socioeconomic decisions that have been made over the last several decades. So when I was in Detroit as a housing director, one of the directors in the housing department, I was responsible for managing public investment in multi-family and mixed use projects, similarly to the one that you mentioned, Eric Orleans Landing, where the city is a recipient of HUD funds, among other things, that are redistributed to affordable housing development projects. And so it's city partnership on land. It's a city partnership on investing dollars. It might be tax abatements or other resources like that. It's a lot of community engagement and understanding where needs are, and then also being able to find private sector partners who are able to meet those needs on behalf of and for the community. So my perspective of affordable housing is coming from the private sector and the public sector. I also have some nonprofit and quasi-government experience as well. So it's a dual perspective that I'm bringing to the table as I'm having this conversation around affordable housing. One of the challenges from a development perspective in Detroit, given what I've told you guys about some of the socioeconomic and demographic makeup of the city is investment is a challenge, frankly. When you're talking about just at a very high level, it costs the same to build something in Detroit as it does to say, build it in New Jersey. But when your rent levels are adjusted for the $100,000 versus the $40,000 and you play that out to how much someone's willing or able to pay and rent or expects to pay and rent, you're talking about very, very different project economics. One of the major challenges in producing affordable housing is construction costs. And then on the flip side, equity investment and the expected return of equity investors in a city like Detroit, if they're looking at a comparable project and say New Jersey or New York, you're looking at very different IRRs, equity multiples, et cetera. Cash on cash is completely different. And so there's a certain appetite for investment that there's a certain investor that will have the appetite for that and the certain investor that, frankly, cannot. And so finding funds and putting into the capital stacks ends up being quite complicated in being able to produce the affordable housing that is needed to meet the population demographics that I described to you earlier. Because of another layer is because of the difficulty and challenges of Detroit development, you don't have a very deep developer pipeline. And as a result, projects tend to take a bit longer. They tend to take a long time. You also tend to have less experienced developers that are trying to produce what they see as a need in the city they might be from or a region that they're from, struggling to put together capital, struggling to put together a deal that makes economic sense, but then also having with a lack of experience, you're not competitive necessarily for like a life hack allocation, for example, that would change the demographics, that would change the economics of your project. So you're challenged by not only the economics of the deal, but in the number, the quality of developers that you're seeing that are trying to produce the number of housing units that are needed to meet the population. It's also an interesting place from a typology perspective, because Detroit is not as dense as New York in any way, shape, or form. Like it is a very large landmass. And it has, again, like I said, that single family history. So you have a lot of historic properties or not historic, old properties. And you also have, they're in a single family context. Not dense single family context. There isn't great transit. There's no subway system like there is in New York or in the Northeast, in Northeastern cities. And so you have this part of the reason why you have this like economic tension is because you have a dispersed population that's not necessarily easily able to access jobs that are in the city because of a lack of transit. And you don't have dense development where you're actually in close proximity to where you're living. So that one of the other challenges of affordable housing is finding great sites that are proximate to resources and employers to serve a population that'll have a limited access to transit. And again, like Eric, your project with Orleans Landing, I'm sure you could speak to that at length what some of the challenges of that site were, but also what some of the great opportunities were for that site on the river just outside of downtown. One of the, and the last point I'll make about Detroit affordability challenges right now is, so there was definitely an influx of lie tech projects in, I mean, 15 plus years ago now. And those projects are reaching the end of their life cycle where they have the opportunity to be marked to market. Their affordability is expiring and a lot of them have very deep capital needs, but the investment in them doesn't necessarily make sense. So it's almost like doubling back on projects that were previously publicly subsidized or subsidized or funded through lie tech to almost like rebuild the capital stack and reposition that project with these challenging economics in this challenging location that may not necessarily be the right, if that project were done today, it probably wouldn't be done in the same place or in the same way. So those are some of the biggest challenges that I saw from the public sector side, I see from the private sector side in Detroit related to affordable housing, colored by just the 85% non-white, 87% non-white population that we're talking about serving. So before I talk about a project that I'm working on, any questions about what I've said so far? Yes, no? Okay, cool. So I am currently working on a project called Elementa. And it is a mixed income for sale project. And the reason why I thought, I'll explain to you a little bit how I got to this particular project. So I believe the next slide gives you some context. Okay, so let me move to this because you guys are working at this screen. So for those of you who aren't familiar with Detroit, I think you guys can see my cursor, right? This is downtown Detroit. There's a river down here. Brush Park is this neighborhood here, the start of the project. This is just, I pulled some just excerpts from a deck that I have for various community presentations or investor conversations. But I wanted to give you guys some context for why this location. So this project is about half mile north of the downtown Detroit Central Business District. So again, prime location, it's one of the few areas of density within the city. It's just outside the stadium district which kind of surrounds here. So it's like an entertainment and stadium district here. Midtown is kind of anchored by Wayne State University, which is one of the biggest universities in Michigan. And there's also talks of the University of Michigan doing an innovation center down here. So there's a lot of energy and anchor tenants here. There's also, it's proximate to the largest employers in Southeast Michigan. We have Google, LinkedIn, the hospitals. There's a whole hospital district up here. There's quick and loans, rocket mortgage, which I guess they're now calling themselves. But some of the largest employers in Michigan. So in terms of that, access to jobs, limited need for transit. And just in terms of like appeal, Brush Park is a historic and affluent neighborhood that has kind of stood the test of time in Detroit. This is just some pictures I pulled. There's been some significant reinvestment in this particular neighborhood over the last decade or so. And so you end up having a lot of restored homes like this. This top picture here is the site to downtown. Is this just a view, a shot to downtown? So you're very, very proximate to the Central Business District. As a project, the way I conceived it, and I'll actually just look back to this page. It's a 16 unit, like I said, mixed income for sale project. And the reason why I thought mixed income was very important for this particular project is this is a desirable neighborhood that holds value. I think there is value in promoting equity and inclusivity through home ownership in when we're talking about affordability. And so I saw this site as a prime opportunity to display that type of project and that type of development in a very intentional way in Detroit. So the Brush Park neighborhood, I think I included some demographics of it. This is a draft slide, but I just threw some stuff on here. Just to give you a sense of, compared to the rest of Detroit population, education levels, percentage of households earning over 100,000 and median home value, just like the delta of this particular neighborhood and why this neighborhood is seen as a desirable place to own a home. And so my idea about creating value for those who have traditionally been excluded from these types of projects hinges on being located in neighborhood that has value for residents. And one of the most important things about this project has been being able to use two things. The approach from an economic perspective to be able to facilitate doing affordable for sale is facilitated by the fact that the market in this neighborhood is so strong. So if you're talking about a 25 or 50% affordable project where you're able to achieve a blended dollar per square foot on sale price that carries the discounted units where the luxury or higher price market units carry the discount of the affordable units and allow there to still be like a high blended average dollar per square foot across the project. That's not always possible in a place like Detroit because not every neighborhood, the valuation of neighborhoods across the city is very, very different. And then the second piece is uniformity. I think we all are familiar with the idea of mixed income projects and can you identify which units are affordable, which units are not, are the finishes different, are they in a different building, are all the studios the affordable units and everything else is not, just the inequality across projects. And so uniformity of units within this project is really important for me as a developer because the only way that value is maintained across units, whether it be from when you're looking at appraisals on the backend for someone selling it, you want there to be a comparable for that unit that isn't impacted by other units next to it. So in everyone's best interest for the units to be uniform and the way that certain changes are made within the project is going to be through upgrades versus downgrades. So it's a standard baseline. And then if there's other amenities or features that are interesting being added to particular units, that's where the Delta can come in in terms of value created or frankly money spent on the project on your particular unit. So just in terms of timeline, like this is a historic district. So I'm going for historic district approval on Wednesday. Right after that is the special zoning district. So I have zoning approval next month with the goal being by the end of this year to have all the necessary city approvals from a design perspective to be able to aim for next construction season in the middle of equity raise right now with the goal, like I said, to be able to close and start construction on everything next construction season. And it's about an 18 month construction timeline for this one. I think the reason why this project, the one last point for me on this project is one of the reasons why it was important for me to do this one as, again, a mixed income for sale is because going back to this idea of affordable housing, I think one of the challenges that I see in the discussion around affordable housing is one we usually only talk about rental. We often only talk about it as, I think affordable housing is an option within the continuum of housing in a particular community. But I don't think affordable housing needs to be seen only as an end state for people who live there. There are people who, I think, optionality for people in terms of housing options of which affordable units or more price accessible. I even don't love the word affordable because when we're talking about affordable, affordable varies from city to city. I think the idea of like price accessible housing in both for sale and rental units is an important consideration as we're talking about housing. That's the continuum of what housing is. Any questions or thoughts or comments or anything so far? I have a question since you talked about being in the process of equity raising right now. And you earlier spoke about the challenges of finding equity investment in Detroit. So I was just curious if you'd elaborate on that process. Yeah, so there is a lot of interest, I think, in investing in Detroit. I found, this has been speaking from personal experience, I found there to be a lot of interest in investing in Detroit. I think there is a, there was, when I first went to Detroit, there was this idea that you could buy a house for a dollar and like make a ton of money. And that's not the case. It's, or maybe $1,000 or whatever it was. So I think there's been a lot of, what I found is there's a lot of interest in investing in Detroit. But like I said, when you, depending on how you're structured, what returns you're looking for, what kind of timeline you're looking at on your funds, Detroit isn't always, hasn't always been the best fit for people who are looking to place money. I think that is exacerbated in the rental market, especially the affordable rental market, if you're competing for public subsidy, if you're competing for li-tech, the numbers end up working out better for those projects, but the timelines are extremely extended. If you're doing unsubsidized rental units, like just market rental, the, even the strong market units, the economics don't necessarily work for live equity. Where I have seen equity be the most, where I have seen equity be successful, equity raises be successful, is in the fore sale market, in neighborhoods like this one. Because the market fundamentals are so strong, the, yeah, the market is so strong. There's not a lot of, one, it's a very small neighborhood, it's in high demand. Units that go for sale here, go for sale at like good, strong market values. And you often have multiple offers on projects or on units. And so when you're talking about the fore sale market in this particular neighborhood, it's very different than if we're talking about like investment in rental units. I think the appeal of this project from an investor's perspective is you're, if you're interested in investing in affordable, this is a way to invest in mixed income affordable that has stronger returns than if you were doing an affordable rental project or even just a market rental project. I also had a question. Yeah. If you sell a unit and it's listed as affordable, how long does it keep that designation? Because you could imagine there could be a lot of issues with down the road, transferring that property to somebody else and... Yes. So it depends on how you finance it. So this project is being done, it is being acquired from the city of Detroit, but there is no public subsidy in it. There are, there's a tax abatement that's in place for this particular site for future homeowners. But in terms of the developer, me signing on like loan documents or public subsidy documents with the city, there is no deed restriction that's accompanied by any of those dollars as might cloud a project that has like federal dollars in it that has a 10 year or a 15 year or 30 year requirement for affordability or a repayment clause where if you sell this unit within five years, it doesn't burn off for five years. So if you sell it in year one, you have to pay back 80% of whatever the discount wasn't you got. So in terms of like deed, like prescribed deed restriction, there is none on this project. The, what the appeal of doing it this way though is that I'm allowed to set the rules and the condo documents of what it would look like as affordable, but the way that these projects, the way these units are gonna be listed, they're not necessarily listed specifically as affordable. The target is through pre-sale and it's intentionally targeted at first time home buyers that qualify 80% AMI. And there's a specific price point for locking in at this particular juncture in the project. And that's the first rollout before they're publicly marketed. And it's in concert with a nonprofit who works on home ownership, assistance, home buyer education. So there's like a almost like a exclusive pipeline that's focused on this particular demographic, if you will, that would fill the affordable quote unquote unit of this particular project. But after you sell the unit, it's sort of out of your hands. If that person breaks that rule and then has to let's say pay back 80%, the government's going to go after them, not you. So the government would not necessarily go after them because it's not restricted through federal. So if in this particular project, it could be in the homeowner association documents, it could be in the condo documents, it can be structured in that way because it's not the type of, it's not like a HUD financed project where HUD is like I gave $100,000 toward this unit, I expected to be an affordable, someone who qualifies at 80% AMI, if they sell it within a year and they make money, I need that money back, I need to recoup my value. It's not structured that way. I see. Really out of question. So, but in terms of the way that some of the prospective buyers are qualifying is that they are sort of receiving soft second mortgages, correct? Yes. So it will look like a soft second mortgage, but what, so there's conversations I'm having with community development financial institutions, CDFIs that are more community focused, they have softer dollars than like a traditional bank. And so in their loan documents with these particular home buyers, there may be something in there that where there's like recapture of whatnot, but in terms of maintaining the distribution of affordability within the community, that's within the actual conducts themselves. And the challenge with that is if you're creating value for someone who is a first time home buyer qualifying at 80% AMI, the challenge is how much, and this is a bit philosophical, but how much do you want to restrict their ability to actually be able to realize that value? And so that is, are you just selling someone a home that then has to be sold to an 80% AMI home buyer who can only qualify for a certain price? So even if it's worth X, they can only pay X minus or Y or whatever, then that person doesn't get to realize the appraised value of that particular property. So that's one thing that is one of the challenges of doing affordable for sale, again philosophically. And that's something that I'm working through with this project is how much restriction do I want to leave on that first time buyer? Because if the goal is to create value, how do you have them also see value as well? Any other question? I guess I'm really curious in how you've been thinking about that trade-off, like how do you make that decision because that goes back to some of the big philosophical things we've been tangling with at the lab and that talk this spring, you know, and just family welfare. And how do you... Oops. I want to stop sharing real quick just to like see you guys' faces. Yeah, no, that is a conversation I have probably on a, at least a monthly basis as I'm putting together the capital stack for this project. My first gut, like just thinking out a little bit, my first gut reaction was, I don't want to restrict anything. So I want people to be able to sell their unit and really maintain value. I think that's very idealistic because I think the challenge of someone purchasing a home for a discount, frankly, and then flipping it to someone who is not first time home buyer or not at 80% AMI, whatever that category is, then you'll end up with a 100% market rate project just like everyone else. And so that's genuinely one of the things I'm struggling with in the affordable for sale space because, yes, you will have an asset on your books that assuming there's no like deed restriction that like hampers the value of your project as an appraised value, as an impact on your net worth as a homeowner, it's great. But when do you actually, when is it turned from paper to actual dollars? That point is it that some of the things I'm considering are time, amount of time spent in the property. Maybe there's like a step up where it's not 80% but it could be someone who qualifies it's like 100% or something like that. There's a couple of different ideas. If there's ideas that you guys have or that you guys have been discussing, I'd love to hear them, but it genuinely is one of the challenges of not being the long-term owner. And at the end of the day, it's a condo association. But if they want to change the rules and change the laws, they can do that as well. So discussion, I don't have an answer. It is a conversation with my, like I said, attorney, finance, et cetera, we're all trying to figure out what the answer is. It might not be the right answer is, but what is the answer that we're going to go with for this particular project? Given that there's no, like I said, federal dollars in there to drive that conversation, there's no city dollars in there to force that conversation, it is ultimately the decision that I as a developer can make. You don't want to burden them with inability to sell when they need to move for a better job. Yeah. Yeah, you don't want it to be a burden. Like you don't want the opportunity to turn into a burden or a curse, and you want people to be able to maximize the decisions and maximize the value of the decision that they're making. Exactly. I've got a question, if I could. First of all, I'm from Ann Arbor, so Detroit's near and dear to my heart. Go blue, and I think it's a great looking project. I'm curious, what profile of investors or partners have you found are open and excited by this type of project? And with that, what have been some of your hurdles? Pitching it, responses, feedback that you've gotten from doing that? Yeah, so I actually skipped forward a little bit into something I was going to end this session on. In parallel to what I'm doing as me, myself, and I, a developer consultant, through my Columbia network, I've stayed in very close contact with some of my classmates. And one of the things that we've been working on for the past couple of years, and there'll be more information I share with you guys as this gets rolled out over the next month or so, is even putting together an equity fund, specifically focused on majority minority communities, and specifically focused on investing in developers, sponsors, property owners of color in those communities across the United States. And so we've been building a pipeline of projects to fund in neighborhoods like this with that have strong economics even within more challenging urban centers. And so this project is part of the conversation of that equity raise. And so again, there is a specific type of investor that is looking to, let's say, do well and do good. That might have a little bit of a different economic incentive than a larger institutional investor, frankly. I think the funny is we had originally started working on this, like I said, a couple of years ago and honestly had put it on the back burner, I would say, when COVID hit in March, April, February, whenever it was, March, I think it was, and then may happen. And the complete shift in the socioeconomic and political climate as a result of some really devastating events of the spring and the summer really kind of threw the idea of what does equity look like in urban centers back into focus and really shifted our focus back to that again. And so the appetite for one, investing a vehicle that's specifically focused on these majority and minority communities and ownership within them, there's a specific demographic of investors that we've targeted as a result of that. Likewise, again, the onus on me to figure out something like affordable for sale for that investor pool is something that I've been kind of charged with using this project as a pilot because this at the end of the day is something that they want to see because one of the challenges, and this kind of leads me into some of my discussion thoughts, one of the things that I don't, yeah, one of the things that I always push for when I'm talking about affordable housing in this professional context is what does it look like to really be an impactful investor in communities of color? One of them, and I'm going to flip back to this as a reminder to myself, actually, there was four things in the challenge. That's awesome. Thank you, and I'd love to hear more about that program. Yeah, so what I will do is we're rolling that out. We have, like, November 2020 on everything right now. So it's going to be a very interesting and unique investment opportunity. I will definitely share it with you guys because it is pitched at a range of investors, a range of participation levels, and a range of involvement in different types of projects. So I think it'd be the perfect thing for you guys to look at. We'd definitely love your feedback as we're going through it. And maybe it's just an opportunity for, maybe I'll bring my partners along. We can give you guys an intro to what we're thinking and how we got there because his story is very interesting and how he conceived the idea of this. And the way that we work together and the things that we've chosen to work on and the things we've chosen to target and why, I think will be worth a discussion at a future date. Leslie also, we'll introduce you to Brookfield, you know, the big problem. They've started a social impact fund. Yes. You wouldn't want them taking, you know, the whole thing, but, you know, because you want people who are more flexible and engaged, but they will provide a nice little sort of seed core of equity for you. So I'll introduce you to Rick. I was just talking about it this morning, yeah. That would be great. So we're, it's 1.55, which I wasn't expecting this to go as far as long as it did. But there are a couple of things that there's like two things I want you guys to take away and I'm gonna just like kind of fast forward through. I don't think it's worth. I'll share my screen for just whatever, but there were, I think I'm gonna skip over one of these and I'm going to, because I think it just goes too far. I want to hear them. I will say them. How about that? I'll say them and we'll go from there. Am I sharing? And then you, close agreement. Okay, so we talked about this, talked about this. I've talked a little bit about my issue with affordable housing, lowercase or uppercase A, being seen as other housing within the continuum of housing options. I think like the notion of like affordable housing as being something that's over there or another type of housing is something you definitely see reflected in like, especially like community meetings where you guys have all heard about like the NIMBY culture of like, I don't want to see that type of project in my particular community. But one of the most humbling things that I've seen happen in community meetings is when you pull up the HUD AMI chart of like what qualifies for affordable and especially in communities like this, it's a little different in New York, but like what a family of four needs to make in order to qualify for housing and the room changes because the idea of how close or how in the middle of that demographic you actually are is something a lot of people don't necessarily recognize when you use the word affordable housing. So that's one takeaway. Two, definitely a longer conversation for another day is my, I would say issue with the lazy use of the word gentrification. I think at the end of the day, everyone wants to live in a desirable neighborhood. But I think what we're glossing over is the fact that gentrification is definitely an issue when there is displacement. Renters tend to be the most vulnerable population. I've also seen people in homeowners, people who are on a fixed income or perhaps inherited a property and don't have the necessary cash flow to maintain it. They're the ones who get kind of left out when property values change. But if you think about like where you live, I myself am a homeowner, I've had some pretty crazy like property value increases as a result of COVID and people moving out of the city into Northern New Jersey. And so as a homeowner, I don't have necessarily an issue with property values going up as a small business owner. Having people who have disposable income to spend money and patronize your shop is not necessarily a bad thing. Having a higher tax base to be able to provide business services to a community. I think as you're talking about that, don't be lazy about your use of the word gentrification because I think again, putting the lens of color back on it, what I've found is people's reaction is let's leave communities of color alone because gentrification, when I think it's very dangerous to not invest in communities of color because in the quest to protect, are you actually depriving them of investment? So that's a question and challenge to you all. This I'm skipping over, totally skipping over. One of the other things that I find really fascinating about our society is we're capitalist, I think as America, I think everyone agree with that. But when you think about housing, it's one of the few things that we have a very specific socialist approach to, specifically affordable housing. And then taking affordable housing at the table again, I think we saw this or we were watching this play out as a result of COVID and the renter population and the landlords and who is supposed to absorb the loss of or the lack of rent being paid when the government has stayed evictions, but most people live in privately owned homes. So where does the actual onus sit in supposedly capitalist society when those things are at odds? You're talking about someone's home or you're talking about someone's business and where that interference point is happening. The last point was a really jarring one. I actually heard on a conversation last week, the guy who was presenting said it. He called the affordable housing industry, the plantation industry. And I heard it and it was really jarring, but I immediately knew what he meant. And just for like really quick context, US racial makeup, 13% black in just HUD funded housing units. And these are privately owned or it could be public housing. It could be privately owned through vouchers or certification certificates or a section eight. About 50% are black. So you have this over indexing of a minority population in publicly funded units, but like significantly because it's only 13% of the United States is actually black. This is like a distinct increase. But for me, one of my challenges about the affordable housing industry and the development industry as a whole is the racial makeup of those who are in control of policy in control of development and who are making the development decisions about residents. This is just a really bad screenshot of HUD, the HUD leadership. I can't go to every single affordable housing developer and show you their profiles, but I just thought, okay, well what's the easiest, it's HUD. And I have friends and colleagues that I've worked with that are on this page, I love them dearly, their kids are great, et cetera. But when you're looking at this page and you're looking at what I showed you in terms of the demographic makeup of the units that are being funded by this particular organization, there's a definite difference. So when he said plantation industry, yeah, it's a little shocking, but if you plan that out, which I'm sure you all can, I thought it was very interesting way of describing it. Oh my God, cool. Great quote to end on that I love was used by, I used to work with Maurice Cox, who's now the commissioner of planning for the city of Chicago. He was the head of planning in Detroit while I was there. But he would always open each community meeting, talking about nothing without us, about us is for us. And I think that this slide and talking about affordable housing, I think, and the idea of investment, investing intentionally, I think that quote speaks to what I'm trying to do as a developer of color in the affordable housing and or housing industry. I do want to stop sharing. There we go. So it's two or two, sorry I'm late, didn't think I would go that long. Here I am. I've noticed that Jezen, who's a staff associate at the lab has posted her email kindly. So if we have additional questions, we please email them to Jezen and she can compile and send over to Cecily later. Yeah, I'm looking at the chat now. I see, I see stuff that I can see. What a fabulous question and conversation. And I think one of the, I just wanted to share that one of the things that the housing lab students have come up with is, let's just, as a first step, let's just not dance around race. When we talk about housing, when we talk about HUD, who's there? Who are they? And who are they saying they're serving? When we talk about displacement, let's talk about, you know, do we mean just random people being displaced? No, it's about, you know, the problems of, you know, Manhattanville, our problems of communities of color being pushed out because they're renters, right? And that's a problem because they no longer have access to the subway and jobs and like be very upfront. So that's just seems like such a basic starting step though. And so inspiring to hear your talk as a way forward and the fund and, you know, count us in as your team at the housing lab that we can help you. That is good to hear. Yeah. We'll be following up with more. I wanna make space for other questions or just in if you have some comments. I was just gonna say, I really appreciate your time today. And I think we always need more affordable for sale unit. So thank you for doing that. Unfortunately, I have to go, I have a sort of workshop at two o'clock, but I'll get your contact information and I'll pass along some information. So one of my projects in New Orleans is part of a hope six grant. We actually did affordable for sale as well. And I can give you some of the language that we use for that in terms of the ability to sell within a certain number of years. That would be really great. I would definitely appreciate that. Thank you. Have a good day. And Eric, especially if I can just sort of pre-announce Eric, we'll have Cecily with us teaching next semester. So. Wonderful. Have a good time. What are you teaching? We're talking about that. I think it's gonna be focused around pre-development and just the development process. It'll be a deeper dive of what she's currently doing, but with that focus on that development track that I think Patrice has been talking to me about. So. With real debates. Yep. What I can do is leave my contact information either and actually you have it. You'll be feel free to share it with people. My email address is, you know, that's where the best, probably the best way to reach me. So people have questions. I see some stuff in the chat. I want to pull down some like links. People have recommended that I do want to like pull down. So I know there's, so feel free to share with any of the attendees too. I should have put that somewhere. And I didn't. And Jessica too, if anyone wants to. Thank you. This is amazing. And if it's, we'll reach out later, but it's okay with you to have this recording be posted if anyone has objections just to write us. And hopefully we'll see you all next week and we'll be in touch with you. Sassily. I think it's green, it's frozen. I think we might have lost her for a second. Thank you, Bernadette. Thank you. Thanks for coming. Yeah, it was wonderful to see all so much we need to work on. Hi. All right. Bye everyone. Yeah. Bye. Have a good weekend. Sorry about that. Not bad. No, don't worry about it. I was just saying that you froze just a little bit at the end, but it was fine. Yeah, I didn't mean, so I kicked myself out of Zoom and I didn't mean to. So that was not supposed to be that abrupt of an ending at all. Is there any way for me to be able to pull down the information that was shared in the chat for that particular meeting? I can send you the chat if you want. That would be great, because I didn't get to... Yeah, and I think GSN is gonna compile all the questions and send them your way. Okay. No, that'd be perfect. I will also tell her to send you the chat and maybe the file that Eric shared. Okay, yeah, because all of that I wanted to pull down at the end. I just, I don't know what happened. Okay. Thank you so much. It was fantastic. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. Bye-bye. Have a great weekend. Bye. You too.