Atlanta’s housing challenges continue to put vulnerable households at risk. The 2026 Point-in-Time Count, coordinated by Partners for HOME, showed a 6% increase in homelessness over 2025. Its accompanying analysis found increased eviction filings in nearly half of City of Atlanta neighborhoods since February 2025. Although the count provides a snapshot rather than a full picture, the findings underscore the need to help people secure and sustain housing.
For Atlanta’s commercial real estate community, this challenge presents an opportunity to contribute resources we know well: available apartments, knowledge of property operations and relationships with owners and managers. Through Open Doors, industry leaders are bringing those resources together, including competitors who have found common ground in helping more Atlantans find a home.
In our business, competition is routine. We compete for capital, acquisitions, development sites and residents. Around the Open Doors board table, however, those same competitors share information about their portfolios and discuss opportunities to expand housing access. That openness is central to the organization’s success.
A Practical Connection
Our personal friendship began as colleagues at RADCO, where we worked together in capital markets. Lisa’s connection to Open Doors began when her company, RADCO, became an early supporter of Open Doors by contributing both rental units and funding. Now in her sixth year on the board, she participates as a donor personally and through RADCO’s properties and financial contributions. Jessica, a native Atlantan, joined the board this year after seeing Lisa’s commitment and learning about the organization’s approach.
What keeps us engaged is a model that addresses a disconnect. Nonprofit organizations help people prepare to exit homelessness, while property owners have apartments available. Yet credit problems, past evictions or limited savings can prevent an otherwise suitable applicant from qualifying for a lease.
Open Doors connects these groups and helps overcome the barriers between them. Its approach reflects an understanding of both the people seeking housing and the businesses providing it. Property owners need a clear process, responsive support and confidence that challenges can be addressed. Nonprofit partners need owners willing to look beyond conventional screening criteria and consider applicants’ circumstances and available support.
Rent guarantees, resident support, case management and a referral app help make the relationship work for both sides. Owners gain access to prospective residents with support behind them, while nonprofits gain a more effective route to available housing.
Turning Industry Knowledge into Opportunity
Commercial real estate leaders bring more than apartments and donations to this effort. They understand rental markets, operating costs, investment decisions and the concerns that shape a landlord’s willingness to participate.
That knowledge helps Open Doors identify opportunities within existing housing. Developing new affordable housing remains important, but available apartments can provide an immediate and more affordable path for people who need a home now.
Open Doors’ board members discuss upcoming projects, potential investments and properties that could participate. These candid exchanges help reveal opportunities that a nonprofit searching independently might never find.
The willingness to share is particularly meaningful in a competitive industry. Participants recognize that addressing homelessness serves a common interest in Atlanta’s future. Their professional relationships become a direct line to owners, managers and peers who can help.
Technology makes those connections more useful. A shared housing resource reduces the repeated calls and separate searches that can slow placement. Nonprofit partners can identify options more efficiently and devote greater attention to helping clients prepare for and maintain their homes.
Building Lasting Success
A successful placement requires more than getting someone through the front door. A missed paycheck or unexpected expense can threaten a household’s stability. Linking housing access with continued support through Open Doors’ 180 nonprofit partners helps residents remain housed and gives landlords confidence in the partnership.
This connection between business understanding and community support is what makes Open Doors valuable. Each participant contributes something essential, and coordination makes those contributions more effective. With a network of 200 management companies, 750 rental communities, 180 nonprofit partners and nearly 14,000 people housed since its inception, the scale demonstrates what collaboration can accomplish.
For those of us who work in housing, involvement is a practical way to apply our experience to a pressing community need. More owners and managers can participate, more industry relationships can create access, and more available apartments can become homes.
That is the Atlanta Way in practice: competitors working toward a shared goal and turning collective knowledge into measurable results. The Open Doors model shows how much our industry can accomplish when we bring our resources together.
Atlanta’s commercial real estate community can help more people find a place to call home. If you own or manage rental properties that may be a fit for the Open Doors portfolio, consider making apartments or single-family homes available through the program. You can also help by introducing Open Doors to a company that may want to get involved. Visit opendoorsatl.org to learn more, become a property partner or make a contribution to the capital campaign.
Open Doors board member Lisa R. Hurd is President and Chief Investment Officer at Atlanta-based real estate investment and development firm The RADCO Companies. She is responsible for all activities at the firm, including investments, capital markets, asset management, investor relations, property management, construction management, and the firm’s proprietary branding and creative agency: Unmaker Studios.
Open Doors board member Jessica Ramsey serves as Vice President of Investment Management at Bell Partners Inc., a vertically integrated multifamily investment manager with approximately 65,000 apartment units under management in 12 US markets. With 20 years of capital markets experience spanning institutional sales, investor relations and equity fundraising, she is responsible for capital generation from the firm’s high-net-worth and institutional equity partners.
Headshots courtesy of Open Doors.
