Weekend Interview: Guerrier Development’s Elde And DeLisa Guerrier On Leading With A Servant’s Heart And Building A Theme Park

This series goes deep with some of the most compelling figures in commercial real estate: the dealmakers, the game-changers, the city-shapers and the larger-than-life personalities who keep CRE interesting.

For Elde and DeLisa Guerrier, real estate has always been about so much more than making money.

The husband-and-wife duo fell into the business after helping inner-city families in Nashville renovate and sell their homes in the wake of the 2008 recession. That effort ended up producing good returns, but more importantly, it saved a family’s credit and dignity, DeLisa Guerrier said.

“It wasn't about the profit, it was about helping families get out of a bad situation,” she said. “We jumped in and invested our own capital to help them catch up on their mortgages and fix up their homes so they could sell them for a profit as opposed to a short sale.”

The pair went on to launch Guerrier Development in 2015 by bringing catalytic pocket developments to underserved areas of Nashville. Through a community-first approach, the firm revitalizes neighborhoods through the addition of residential, retail, entertainment and houses of faith.

The pair’s latest passion project is Storyville Gardens, a $1.2B mixed-use theme park that aims to boost Tennessee literacy statistics by immersing children in a fun and interactive environment. 

“A lot of real estate in the past has been viewed as a building, as a house, a thing,” DeLisa Guerrier said. “But it’s really all about the people. The people are the most important part of any development or any community.” 

Today, Guerrier Development is one of Nashville’s largest development and investment firms, with roughly $500M worth of projects in the pipeline. DeLisa and Elde Guerrier sat down with Bisnow to discuss their latest projects, tackling the downturn, what it’s like being Black leaders in a predominantly white industry and the importance of never forgetting where they came from.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Bisnow: Elde, you grew up on a farm in Haiti. And DeLisa, I understand you come from humble beginnings as well. Guerrier Development is now one of the most active developers in Nashville. How did those early experiences help guide your careers?

Elde: Growing up in a third-world country, coming to the United States, it’s a luxury just to be here. When I was young, I took a lot for granted. Today, at 43 years old, I know what it means to actually come from a third-world country. How we treat our customers. How we respect anyone who comes through the door. It takes a mindset of not taking anyone for granted to not take the small deal for granted because it’s not always about the deal — it’s about the people around the table. My background of growing up in Haiti has allowed me to appreciate where I am today.

DeLisa: I grew up in Oakland, California, and there aren't a lot of people who make it out of Oakland. It really has given me a heart to want to do more in the community and help to educate and extend a helping hand to people who may not have opportunities. I credit a lot of it, first to God, but second to my mother, for exposing us to different things and allowing us to shoot high and believe in ourselves. There aren't a lot of people who have that kind of support, so there's a lot of things that my heart wants to do to help be that bridge for other children who may not have great representation.

Bisnow: DeLisa, you originally embarked on a career in medicine, but decided to leave that behind and go into business with Elde. Can you talk about how that decision came to be and what drove you to make such a pivot?

DeLisa: Growing up, I never looked at owning a business as an option for me. I was on the verge of heading to medical school, and I had this choice to leave and go to med school or drop what I was doing and help him grow his company. I chose the latter. I can't tell you why, it was just something in my heart. I didn't even know how to write a check when I jumped in to help him with the business, but we grew that company substantially in just a few years, and then the doors for real estate opened up.

My husband owned an automotive shop at the time, and that was our fundraiser. It really allowed us to gain great relationships in the community, which really enhanced our ability to make an impact and build relationships when it came to real estate projects.

Bisnow: Can you talk a little bit about the early years of your real estate business? What were some of those first projects that helped you get involved in the industry?

DeLisa: It was an accident that we got into real estate. What started our development career was there was a partnership that had gone bad. A client of ours in the automotive world came to my husband and asked for help to buy this property to allow that partnership to be dissolved. We went and looked at the property, and we saw that it was in an area that had a lot of potential. We bought it from them and started the process of developing the land into four townhomes in East Nashville. 

We basically sat at that site every single day and watched every brick, every stone, every nail go into it. But we weren't the builder, and if we were going to pay for mistakes we may as well pay for our own. So I went and became licensed in Tennessee as one of the few Black women with a commercial, residential and industrial license in construction, and then we started building our own projects.

Bisnow: Y’all have really focused your business around Nashville. What is it about that market that is so enticing to you from a development perspective?

Elde: The market is young and vibrant, and it’s our home base. Real estate has been a really straightforward investment vehicle for many families for many generations. The more you know your location, your area, the less risky the investment is. We know Nashville. I’ve been here since 1994, and my wife came here for college. 

We have projects in Atlanta and Alabama, but it’s very difficult because we don’t know Atlanta. We know the product, but we have to hire new people to hopefully do the work we normally do in Nashville to get to understand the community.

Bisnow: You have really made a name for yourself building attainable housing units on land owned by churches. Talk about the logic behind that strategy and how it has served to accelerate housing stability in Nashville.

DeLisa: We have such a big heart for God and pouring back into his kingdom. Because of that, we have purchased quite a few churches, whether to rehab them or enhance them in some way, and allow churches to either buy them, give them to them or use them. 

We started asking ourselves, “What is it that churches can do to not just use their building one day a week? How can we be good stewards of all that is provided there?”

One church had been trying to develop the land around them and relocate their church to a place that was more visible to the community. We were able to take the property through all the necessary entitlements, relocate the church to the most visible space on the property, and we plan for 378 apartment units on the property as well. We believe that will be such an enhancement to the church and all of the amenities the church has planned for the community. 

It’s a great partnership, and we have quite a few more that we’ve been working on. It solves their problem to be able to have some sort of passive income coming into the church and also to provide a space that won’t just be used one day.

Bisnow: You have so many exciting projects in the pipeline, but the one that stands out is Storyville Gardens. Can you talk about how that project came to be and where it stands today? 

DeLisa: I call it my passion project. It’s the one that keeps me excited every day and always has some sort of hill to overcome, and it’s fun to do that. It’s a theme park based on books and stories from all over the world, and it is designed with the intent to promote literacy. 

In Tennessee, one in five children is not up to grade-level reading. There was a study that showed that if we can just get children to read for fun, that it will significantly increase their test scores. When I was growing up, I was an avid reader, and I love to write. It was an escape, and it was something that helped me get as far as I did academically. 

I had it in my heart to provide something in Nashville for families because, although I love Nashville and what it has been for our family, it’s not the most family-friendly place when it comes to destinations. We had a very successful theme park that closed in 1997, so it’s a proven market that we know is just waiting for something like this. 

Having the purpose of being able to challenge literacy statistics is something that has garnered a lot of support and excitement in the community and is near and dear to a lot of people’s hearts. Right now, we have secured quite a bit of land — we’re on a little bit over 800 acres. We are working with the local government to finalize all the details. The park is a small part of the development, and then we have a lot of other incredible amenities, both residential and hospitality components, along with a pretty incredible golf course.

Bisnow: Multifamily has been your bread and butter, and it’s really been a roller coaster for the last few years with explosive development in the Sun Belt and then a tempering of rental rates in certain markets. How are you navigating that environment and how do you expect the supply glut to pan out?

Elde: That is real estate, right? It goes up and it goes down, but it will never bottom out. And it’s still one of the best investments in the world. What you are seeing in a market always happens before an election; it always happens when a market is doing great. 

We thought things were going to dive down when Covid happened, and some commercial markets did see a dive-down. But on the residential side and the mixed-use side in the Nashville market, we saw a tremendous overcome of Covid. 

We knew in the back of our heads things were going to change — interest rates, inflation, would put a hole in the market. We started in a market like this, so we know how to pivot very well. We are still building. We still have product in the ground. 

DeLisa: It’s helpful being in a market like Nashville where a lot of the growth has been the result of massive job creation. The blessing is that we haven’t seen a slowdown of that, and so even though we had a lot of units come online, the job market is still very strong, and so it has kept a lot of people — a lot of our developer friends and us included — in a very optimistic place when it comes to our market and what the need will be. 

Bisnow: There has been a little bit of movement in terms of diversity and inclusion in CRE since the murder of George Floyd, but it remains notoriously white and male. What has it been like establishing yourselves as leaders in this field and as one of the only Black couples in the U.S. to own your own CRE development and investment firm? 

DeLisa: Elde grew up in Haiti, and when I would talk to him about these huge disparities and challenges it was like I was speaking a foreign language. Where he grew up it was never about Black and white, it was about rich and poor. That allowed me to focus on the work and our goals as opposed to who around us looks like us.

It’s been a blessing to be an arm and a branch to those who want to get into the market we are in and to be the representation for that. But it has also benefited us to not focus on what the disparities are, but rather what the opportunities are. That’s where we have found the biggest blessings.

Elde: It’s very important to me, at 43, to communicate with the younger generation. America was designed and built by those who didn’t like what was happening to them, so they formed something better. It was not easy, it was not given. It’s very important that young people who want to be in business understand that just because you start somewhere doesn’t mean that’s where you’re going to end up. It’s all about your mind and what you think. If you’re not where you want to be, let it shape you to become humble, because it’s very easy to forget where you came from once things start working really well. Everyone who made it in this country will tell you it was not easy. 

Bisnow: Can you give us your bold prediction for this year? 

Elde: This election is the most important election, and it’s not about Republican or Democrat. Where we are right now, the country has prevailed, and we will make the right choice because we do know what we want. Because of technology, anyone can be engaged and know what is happening. I believe we are going to have a really good outcome. It’s a strong election, and I am praying, but America will choose. America has never made the same mistake twice.

Bisnow: This is a weekend interview, so what is your favorite weekend routine or activity?

Elde: To lay down on the couch with my wife. To be a husband and a father. My wife calls it the “hustle and bustle” of the day-to-day, taking care of other people and designing stuff for the next decade, but the weekend is about us and the Lord.

DeLisa: For me, it’s the exact opposite. On the weekend, at least once, for an hour, we will take the kids to one of our real estate projects. They will see things and ask questions. The line of work-life balance is very blurred, and we prefer it that way. We like the kids to get involved in our work.