Former Freddie Mac Multifamily Head Joins Greystone To Grow Social Impact Housing Efforts
Multifamily veteran Debby Jenkins is joining Greystone as executive managing director. Jenkins, who previously led multifamily for Freddie Mac, has spent over 30 years in real estate.
Jenkins' role will be focused on social impact investing in affordable housing, creating and financing strategies that preserve and make a positive impact on local communities.
“The prospect of having the tools and the team to build what is possible for Affordable and Social Impact Housing is what drew me to this opportunity at Greystone,” Jenkins said in a press release.
Greystone CEO Steve Rosenberg said the company aims to be a leader in social impact housing.
“Debby is a true visionary in our industry, and her diverse expertise in leading the nation’s largest mission-driven multifamily finance platform aligns with our goals in becoming a Social Impact Housing leader," he said in the release.
Jenkins previously was a senior vice president at Wells Fargo. She is a board member of the MBA Open Doors Foundation and the CEO and partner of Comunidad Credit Capital.
Greystone develops and partners with others to provide mission-driven affordable housing, according to its website. The company is constructing or renovating more than 1,000 affordable units across Texas, Indiana and North Carolina. Jenkins will be involved in growing similar future projects.
Real estate players have upped affordable housing and social impact investing efforts in the past year. In May, Nuveen acquired Omni New York LLC, adding Omni's 12,000-unit affordable housing portfolio to its social impact housing fund.
Nuveen Senior Portfolio Manager of Impact Investing Pamela West said at the time that demand for affordable housing is intensifying nationwide and investors are increasingly interested in projects that benefit society and housing long-term.
Spending 30% or more of income on rent is the new normal in large metros across the country. But in 1999, New York City was the sole area where that was the case, according to Moody’s Analytics. Despite national rent dropping 0.9% and average rent-to-income lowering to 29.6% in the first quarter, RTI levels are still too high for millions of Americans.
