In 1991, Noel Khalil, a New Yorker born to Jamaican immigrants, founded a company called Columbia Residential in Atlanta. Khalil had a mission: build affordable housing for working families like his.

“Noel felt that just because a person is low income, it doesn’t mean they don’t deserve quality housing,” said Robert Barfield, vice president of construction at Columbia Residential. “He always said that we were building cathedrals for God’s children.”

In the span of 30 years, until his passing in 2021, Khalil raised the company from a kitchen-table business to one of the Southeast’s leaders in multifamily affordable housing. Columbia Residential, which owns and manages the homes it builds, has developed more than 10,000 units in Georgia, Florida, Texas, Louisiana, and Tennessee.

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What Khalil wanted was to raise the quality of life for his residents. He knew how difficult it can be for families with lower incomes to pay their utility bills. That’s why he was among the first to equip his homes with [ENERGY STAR®] appliances.

This focus on resident financial wellbeing prepared Columbia Residential for a major change in the affordable housing sector that occurred in the early 2000s: the introduction of green building certifications.

Continue reading about green cathedral builders like Columbia Residential »
Source: Enterprise Community Partners

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