Atlanta Affordable Housing Fund Launches

ATLANTA—Some of Atlanta’s most seasoned real estate leaders have joined to launch the Atlanta Affordable Housing Fund, LP (AAHF), a social impact fund designed to provide low interest rate financing for affordable housing projects.

The founding board members include David Allman, Regent Partners; Robert LaChapelle, CBRE; Aaron Goldman and Tim Schrager, Perennial Properties; Chuck Shallat, Lincoln Property Company; Egbert Perry, The Integral Group; Dave Loeffel, Highlands Residential; and Marc Pollack, RangeWater Real Estate (formerly known as Pollack Shores). Ashani O’Mard, a local fundraising and affordable housing development expert, has been named as its executive director.

In response to the growing demand and diminishing supply of affordable housing units, the founders of AAHF identified an opportunity to create positive social, cultural and economic impact by investing in affordable housing and using their real estate experience to put together often complex financing structures. The $25 million fund will deploy low-cost capital to qualified developers and sponsors. The board \ is officially launching efforts to capitalize the fund, which they believe will provide financing to create and/or preserve up to 1,500 affordable housing units.

“The co-sponsors of the fund (David Allman and Marc Pollack) have been active in the HouseATL initiative and saw an opportunity to engage and leverage more private sector partners in addressing the housing affordability crisis occurring in our region,” O’Mard tells GlobeSt.com. “Many of the founding board members become engaged with AAHF through their board service with the Atlanta Real Estate Collaborative, a nonprofit that provides a platform for real estate professionals to directly offer their expertise and resources to issues such as homelessness. This fund was a great opportunity to expand our region’s impact investing ecosystem by bringing more partners to the table to focus on this critical regional issue.”

O’Mard says potential investors will include a mix of individuals, foundations, institutions, and corporations. AAHF’s investors will receive an economic return as well as a social return quantified in a report card that outlines the impact of their investment.

According to ULI Atlanta, there are currently 340,000 cost-burdened households in metro Atlanta. Based on the city’s current inventory and projected future growth, ULI predicts that Atlanta needs to create approximately 10,000 affordable housing units per year for the next 10 years to address the deficit.

O’Mard’s role as executive director will be supported by the Atlanta Real Estate Collaborative (AREC), a nonprofit and the creator of Open Doors, which has housed thousands of homeless persons in metro Atlanta. AAHF is aligned with HouseATL, an ongoing initiative driven by civic leaders to address the City of Atlanta’s affordable housing shortage.