Black Residents Are Being Priced Out of Atlanta as Lawmakers Profit
As corporate investors snap up metro Atlanta homes and drive up prices, nearly two-fifths of state legislators meant to regulate them are personally invested in the state’s housing market.
This article was produced in partnership with the nonprofit newsroom Type Investigations, where Chauncey Alcorn and Adam Mahoney are 2025-2026 Ida B. Wells fellows.
When Kenneth Porter moved to Atlanta from Wilmington, North Carolina, in 2016 to advance his career in the entertainment industry, he rented part of a two-bedroom townhouse on Atlanta’s eastside for about $600 per month.
Over the past decade, however, even as he’s moved into a smaller apartment, he’s watched his rent double — and has been unable to buy a home.
Metro Atlanta is undergoing a housing crisis, which has been fueled in part by corporate investors and left unchecked by Georgia state lawmakers. Many of these lawmakers are real estate investors themselves, an investigation by Capital B and Type Investigations has found.
Porter is one of many Atlanta residents who face the challenge of finding an affordable home. In 2024, he made an offer on a modest, two-bedroom ranch-style house near the intersection of Avon Avenue and Cascade Road, in the city’s historic West End, which was on the market for $260,000.
The sale fell through, Porter said, after the sellers raised the listing price and a corporate investor swooped in with an all-cash offer he couldn’t compete with.
“It’s not fair at all,” Porter said. “It’s like David versus Goliath.”
Atlanta has long been called the Black Mecca, and through the early 2000s, the city boasted a reputation as an affordable city with a growing and prosperous Black middle class. In recent years, however, the lack of affordable housing has pushed thousands of Black people to the margins — or out of the city entirely.
A 2025 report from the National Community Reinvestment Coalition found that, among American cities, Atlanta has been one of the hardest hit by gentrification. Between 1980 and 2020, Atlanta had the second-highest number of census tracks flip from majority Black to majority white. Only Washington, D.C., had more.
Locally, the rate of corporate ownership of single-family rental stock is 11 times the national average, according to research by Georgia State University professor Taylor Shelton.
In some areas, such as majority-Black Henry County, corporate investors own nearly 70% of all single-family rental properties, Shelton found.
Researchers have found that when these companies achieve dominance in specific neighborhoods, they exercise significant control over rent levels and housing availability. With deep pockets, they can repeatedly bid over asking prices, limiting opportunities for families to buy homes. That, in return, has forced many to remain renters or lease houses from these very companies.
“You’ve got people who are putting all of their lifeblood into the community and trying to get a piece of it,” Porter said. “And then you’ve got people who just see this place as a line item and nothing more.”
Kenneth Porter stands outside his southwest Atlanta home on Nov. 5, 2025. (Chauncey Alcorn/Capital B)
Georgia lawmakers drafted multiple bills last year that aimed to help more Atlanta families compete against the behemoth corporate landlords, but they went nowhere.
One reason may be lawmakers’ own real estate interests, and the influence the real estate lobby wields inside the Gold Dome. An investigation by Capital B and Type Investigations found that a significant number of state lawmakers have direct financial ties to the real estate industry.
At least 93, or just under two-fifths, of Georgia’s 236 state lawmakers are invested in the real estate industry, either through owning rental property themselves or investing in companies that sell, develop, and manage real estate, according to an analysis of financial disclosures.
In total, state lawmakers own more than 170 rental or investment properties across the state, the disclosures show. These properties together are worth an estimated $45 million, according to an analysis of the financial disclosures, property assessment records, and Zillow’s Home Values Index, which estimates housing prices. The actual figure may be far higher, due to incomplete assessment values.
State lawmakers also received more than $776,000 in campaign donations from the corporate real estate lobby during the 2022 and 2024 election cycles, according to new research from the NAACP Legal Defense Fund and the Housing Justice League. This includes more than $622,000 to state senators, and more than $153,000 to key state House leaders.
“Most people think that the bills are made in the House or the Senate and by the legislators, but it’s made in the hallways, mostly by the lobbyists,” said state Sen. Donzella James, who introduced a rent regulation bill, Senate Bill 125, in 2023. The bill ultimately stalled.
Real estate lobbying groups gave far more heavily to Republican candidates than to Democrats, the research shows. Republican state Senate candidates received more than $478,000 during the two election cycles, while Democratic Senate candidates received more than $144,000.
State Rep. Jasmine Clark, whose Gwinnett County district had the highest number of corporate-owned single-family rental homes in 2024, said that when it comes to housing, some state lawmakers seem to be putting their own financial interests ahead of the needs of their constituents.
“You’ve got people in our chambers, on both sides of the aisle, that are directly impacted by some of the policies that these housing advocates want,” Clark said. “A lot of stagnation that we see is because there’s someone in the room that will be hurt if that policy passes.”
Ties to the real estate industry
Across metro Atlanta, corporate investors have deliberately purchased homes in lower-income areas, where the majority-Black population meant that properties were undervalued, research from Georgia Tech has found.
The strategy worked. Over a single decade, more than $4 billion in home equity went to investment firms rather than to individual Black families — a conservative estimate, researchers say.
House Bill 555, which would have capped the number of single-family homes that a corporate landlord could own statewide at 2,000, tried to push back against that dispossession. But it failed to get a vote on the House floor.
A number of lawmakers on the 17-member House Judiciary Committee that initially considered the bill have financial or personal ties to the real estate industry, our investigation found.
Republican Chuck Efstration of Mulberry, the House majority leader,collected nearly $30,000 in industry contributions during the 2022 and 2024 election cycles, according to campaign finance disclosures. Democrat Stacey Evans of Atlanta and Republican Deborah Silcox of Sandy Springs hold property portfolios worth more than $5 million in total.
Republican Trey Kelley of Cedartown is an investor in a real estate holding company. Republican Stan Gunter’s spouse is a real estate agent.
Efstration, who initially signed on as a co-sponsor of HB 555, declined multiple requests for comment. The other committee members did not respond to requests for comment.
Charles Bullock, a professor of political science at the University of Georgia, stressed that while it’s not illegal for lawmakers to own or invest in real estate, doing so can create a conflict of interest.
“If there are new regulations being proposed, which they see as being harmful to their own holdings, I would expect that they would oppose it,” Bullock said. Owning property, he said, “probably influences the way you see the world.”
HB 555 was also low-hanging fruit for industry opposition groups. In the weeks leading up to and after the bill’s introduction in February 2025, the Georgia Association of Realtors — through its political action committee, known as Realtors PAC or RPAC — held dinners and meetings with four of the committee members, according to state ethics disclosures.
Brad Mock, CEO of the Georgia Association of Realtors, told Capital B and Type Investigations that the group supports efforts to increase affordable housing in the region. But it opposed HB 555 because the bill put an “arbitrary cap” on the number of homes Georgians can buy and would create a legislative slippery slope.
“As soon as that cap goes on the books, what’s going to happen next year?” Mock said. “‘Well, that didn’t work. Let’s knock it down to 1,000 [single-family homes]. Let’s knock it down to 500. Let’s knock it down to 50.’”
Rep. Derrick McCollum, who originally introduced HB 555, attempted to carve out space for small landlords, tailoring the bill to spare independent operators from the cap on home purchases. It didn’t matter. The bill was withdrawn at the beginning of April.
“It was actually the Georgia Realtors who got it killed,” McCollum said. “They just locked down on my bill.”
McCollum himself is the manager of three real estate investment LLCs and the owner of five rental properties.
At least 93, or just under two-fifths, of Georgia’s 236 state lawmakers are invested in the real estate industry, either through owning rental property themselves or investing in companies that sell, develop, and manage real estate, according to an analysis of financial disclosures.
The firms with big stakes in Atlanta
Beyond driving up sale prices and rental costs, corporate landlords frequently shroud their identities through complex webs of LLCs, limiting the ability of residents to advocate for better conditions, experts say.
Research led by Shelton at Georgia State University found that just three firms — Invitation Homes, Pretium Partners, and Amherst Holdings — control more than 19,000 single-family rentals in metro Atlanta, but they disguised their holdings under 191 different owner names scattered across 74 unique addresses.
House Bill 374 sought to address these issues by allowing local governments to create housing management databases to track owners of rental properties with at least five units in their jurisdiction. For cities and counties, it aimed to be a tool to finally hold absentee landlords accountable.
But as with HB 555, it didn’t take long for industry opposition to mobilize. In the weeks surrounding HB 374’s introduction in early February last year, RPAC lobbyists dined multiple times with members of the House Governmental Affairs Committee.
According to ethics disclosures, four representatives met with the association’s lobbyists in the weeks leading up to the bill’s introduction, and one the week it was introduced. One member, Rep. Alan Powell, who is invested in four real estate companies, had two such meetings within that timespan. Throughout March, as the bill awaited a floor vote, more lawmakers met with the group’s lobbyists.
“They’re definitely one of the top — if not the top — lobbying groups in the state right now,” David Wheaton, policy counsel for the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, which advocates for affordable housing policies, said regarding the real estate lobby.
The Georgia Association of Realtors spent at least $40,000 on meetings and meals with lawmakers in the General Assembly over the 2024 and 2025 legislative sessions, according to financial disclosures.
Mock, the Georgia Association of Realtors CEO, said the industry group opposed HB 374, due to concerns over how information about the location of rental properties could be misused. But he said the association doesn’t tell lawmakers how they should vote in exchange for campaign donations. “I don’t think there’s any expectation of anything in return,” Mock said.
Lawmakers on the House Governmental Affairs Committee also have financial ties to the real estate industry, our investigation found. Of its 20 members, nine lawmakers — eight of them Republicans — own rental property or are invested in real estate businesses.
By the end of February, the committee had reported out a substitute version of the bill that gutted its core provisions. The amended version included so many exemptions that they rendered the bill nearly useless, advocates said. By April, the legislation had been withdrawn and effectively tabled.
Rep. Phil Olaleye, who signed on as a co-sponsor of HB 374, said he was disappointed that the legislation didn’t move forward. But he said lawmakers will need to find a way to work with the real estate industry to enact reforms.
“We’ve got to come together, and we’ve got to figure out what we can do legislatively to put some common-sense guardrails in place to protect the interests of Georgians, to protect the interests of homebuyers and renters, because it’s gotten out of control,” Olaleye said. “No one benefits if our working-class, middle-class families are struggling and housing-insecure. And right now, that’s the case for far too many Georgians.”
Efforts at reform in Georgia
Just as previous reform efforts have faced an uphill battle in the legislature, recent measures have similarly struggled to gain traction.
In January, McCollum introduced HB 1115, which, like HB 555, sought to limit the number of single-family homes institutional investors can own. That measure failed to pass before the March 5 Crossover Day deadline. Crossover Day is the deadline for bills to pass in at least one of Georgia’s two legislative chambers to be signed into law during the same year. Bills that fail to advance can still be added to legislation that has passed in at least one chamber.
Georgia Republicans have thrown their support behind state Sen. Greg Dolezal’s SB 463. Dolezal has pointed out metro Atlanta leads the nation in private equity home ownership, and his bill would bar institutional investors from acquiring more than 500 single-family homes in the state. The Senate passed the bill on March 3, but it awaits consideration in the state House.
“The American Dream belongs to families,” Dolezal said in a post on X in February.
While legislators continue to debate possible reforms, Georgia residents are still feeling squeezed.
“So many people in Georgia are struggling with rent, homeownership,” said Alison Johnson, executive director of the Housing Justice League. “People should have an opportunity if they want to become homeowners … particularly people at the margins, Black and brown people that have been marginalized.”
Kenneth Porter, the aspiring Black homebuyer, said the current situation has forced him to set aside his dream of buying a home for the time being. The downturn in Georgia’ film industry has impacted his income, and he said he may have to move back to his childhood home in Wilmington because he can no longer afford the spiraling cost of housing in Atlanta.
Despite the setbacks, though, Porter hasn’t completely given up on the idea of one day owning his own home. Going forward, he said, he hopes lawmakers will do more to help working professionals like himself become homeowners.
“We’ve been preached to that this is part of the American Dream, and if you have the opportunity to seize it, then more power to you,” he said. “I can’t wait until I might be able to get a chance once again.”
Research led by Shelton at Georgia State University found that just three firms — Invitation Homes, Pretium Partners, and Amherst Holdings — control more than 19,000 single-family rentals in metro Atlanta, but they disguised their holdings under 191 different owner names scattered across 74 unique addresses.
Who gets the most campaign money from real estate lobbyists?
Georgia state lawmakers received at least $776,187 from the real estate lobby during the 2022 and 2024 election cycles, according to a new analysis of campaign finance reports by the NAACP Legal Defense Fund and the Housing Justice League. This includes more than $622,000 to state senators, and more than $153,000 to key state House leaders.
Among the largest contributors were the Georgia Association of Realtors, Georgians for Quality Housing Options PAC, and the Georgia Better Government Fund, the political action committee sponsored by the Georgia Apartment Association.
The post Georgia Lawmakers With Real Estate Ties Are Writing the State’s Housing Laws appeared first on Capital B News.
