Season 9, Episode 3:
America is about 10 million homes short, and Bart Mitchell has spent more than three decades trying to close that gap. As President and CEO of The Community Builders, one of the country's largest nonprofit affordable-housing developers, he's helped turn a once-obscure federal tax credit into the backbone of how the U.S. finances low-income housing.
Bart joined The Community Builders in 1989, six months before a recession, tasked with selling Wall Street on a brand-new program nobody understood. Since becoming CEO in 2012, he's grown the organization's footprint across New York, Boston, Chicago, and Virginia while carrying real financial risk along the way. In this conversation, Bart breaks down why zoning, not money, is the real bottleneck in solving the shortage, what it actually costs to carry a project through years of city and state approvals, and why most Americans have driven past affordable housing without ever realizing it.
Shoutout to our sponsor, WareSpace — turning underused industrial, flex, office, and big-box properties into micro warehouse space for small businesses.
CHAPTERS
00:00 - Introduction to Bart Mitchell and The Community Builders
04:14 - How Bart Entered Affordable Housing
06:14 - The Early LIHTC Market
13:05 - How Low-Income Housing Tax Credits Work
15:21 - The Community Builders’ Origin Story
18:57 - Rebuilding Public Housing as Mixed-Income Communities
22:17 - Why America Is 10M Homes Short
29:10 - Zoning, Money, Speed, and Development Risk
38:36 - Nonprofit Versus For-Profit Affordable Housing
44:43 - What Bart Would Change About Housing Policy
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About No Cap Podcast
Commercial real estate is a $20 trillion industry and a force that shapes America’s economic fabric and culture. No Cap by CRE Daily is the commercial real estate podcast that gives you an unfiltered ”No Cap” look into the industry’s biggest trends and the money game behind them. Each week co-hosts Jack Stone and Alex Gornik break down the latest headlines with some of the most influential and entertaining figures in commercial real estate.
About CRE Daily
CRE Daily is a digital media company covering the business of commercial real estate. Our mission is to empower professionals with the knowledge they need to make smarter decisions and do more business. We do this through our flagship newsletter (CRE Daily) which is read by 65,000+ investors, developers, brokers, and business leaders across the country. Our smart brevity format combined with need-to-know trends has made us one of the fastest growing media brands in commercial real estate.
