Embarking upon a career in real estate can seem almost impossible for a young person starting without money and the right connections. That’s especially true in a place like New York City, where barriers to entering the real estate business are high.
“Opportunities are scarce,” said Kirk Goodrich, president of Monadnock Development, based in Brooklyn. That’s true for many people beginning careers in real estate—and especially true for African Americans and other people of color.
Goodrich was one of five panelists who shared how, as African Americans, they found success in New York real estate. The panel, “The Changing Face of Commercial Real Estate—a Program in Recognition of Black History Month,” took place February 11, 2025, through a partnership among ULI New York, the Real Estate Board of New York (REBNY), and Council of Urban Real Estate (CURE), at REBNY’s Manhattan office.
“The common threads of the panel are working hard, connecting, being resourceful, being resilient,” said moderator Derek Fleming, senior adviser with HR&A Advisors.
DEI programs at risk
The panel took place just a few weeks after President Donald Trump, who quickly moved to end federal funding for many diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs, with some private companies followed suit.
“For young people under 35, you might not have known a time when there weren’t all these great programs,” said Kimberly Hardy—senior vice president of diversity, inclusion, and compliance for McKissack—who works in the firm’s New York offices. McKissack is the oldest minority/women-owned professional design and construction firm in the United States. “You can succeed, regardless,” Hardy said.
The business of real estate has historically been an area to which many ambitious minority professionals have been drawn but have found it very difficult to penetrate. African Americans and other people of color are still under-represented in the range of commercial real estate verticals, Fleming said. Of the estimated 112,046 private real estate developers nationwide, 447 are African American and 175 are Latino. At top real estate firms of all types, just 9.3 percent of senior executives are people of color, he said, citing a report from Grove Collective Foundation, based in Washington, D.C.
This under-representation does not reflect the job performance of African Americans and other people of color in real estate. “The source of the problem of under-representation in commercial real estate appears to be about the lack of opportunity and access, not about performance and leveling up competitively in the business,” Fleming said. He cited another analytic from the Grove report: small- and medium-sized Latino and African American developers outperform their white counterparts in terms of producing revenue for their investors.
“Diversity is not a favor,” Goodrich said. Even people who oppose DEI initiatives often celebrate the careers of African American athletes or such performers as Aretha Franklin and Michael Jackson, he added. “We’re better off because those fields are diverse. If that’s true for those fields, then why wouldn’t it be true for architecture or science or real estate development?”
Breaking into the business
For young people trying to get into the real estate business, the panelists had a few words of advice.
“Just keep knocking. You cannot be denied at the door,” said Leonard Allen-Smith, founder and CEO of Allen Smith Equities, a development firm based in New York City. In particular, young people need to build their own network of professional relationships—particularly if those people were not born into a real estate family. One strategy is to join organizations including ULI (Urban Land Institute), REBNY, and CURE, Allen-Smith said. “Learn how to play the game.”
They should do more than go to events and hand out business cards. They should join committees and volunteer their time. “Getting on individual committees allows those people to see not only your thought process, but also your work ethic,” said DeVon Prioleau, founder and managing principal of PRI-O-LEAU Development Group. “That has been my ladder to success and how I’ve been able to rub shoulders with some of New York City’s best and brightest.” Prioleau joined CURE more than 13 years ago, and for the last three years he has been president of that organization.
“To succeed in this business, somebody has to trust you. Someone has to believe in you,” Allen-Smith said. “When you’re showing up at the door, and you’ve never done anything and nobody knows who you are, you’re not going to get that shot.”
Making these connections—even joining the right organizations—can seem difficult at first. As a lawyer in her 20s, Hardy worked to join her law firm’s softball team. With time, players on the team tended to become partners at the firm. Women were not exactly encouraged to play. Hardy and two other female associates eventually earned places on the team with help from two women who were already partners at the firm. “They would take us to lunch at 3 p.m.,” Hardy said. At these late lunches, the lawyers could talk privately about the firm, their career plans—and how to infiltrate the softball team and amend the lawyers’ softball league rules.
Patience, humility, perseverance
The panelists also embodied hard work and patience to find their places in the real estate business.
“I had a long journey,” Goodrich said. “I wanted to be a developer 17 years before I became one.” For about a decade, he worked for a subsidiary of the organization now known as Enterprise Community Partners, helping to finance affordable housing projects for other developers. “You need the humility to start in a job that is not exactly what you want to do,” he said. “It’s a grind. It’s a journey to be better.”
Before founding his own development firm, Allen-Smith worked at KPMG. His first career taught him a lot about perseverance. It took him numerous attempts to become a certified public accountant. “That is part of the journey” he said. “Getting up at 4:00 in the morning and studying [for the exams] until 7:00 . . . and then being in the office until 10:00 at night and going home and doing it again the next day and continuing to fail—that was the seed for the success that came later.”
Young people learning about the business should also look for mentors. They might not be from their own demographic group or generation. “People don’t have to look like you to provide the opportunity and open the door,” Hardy said. “When you’re looking for mentors and opportunities, you sometimes have to go outside your comfort zone.”
Connecting across these divides helps both the mentor and the young person who is learning.
“I’m speaking to the 60-year-olds in the room: If you don’t know the 25-year-olds at your office, you’re doing yourself a disservice,” Prioleau said. “To the 25-year-olds: If you don’t know the OGs—the 60-year-olds in your office—you’re doing yourself a disservice.”
Finally, the panelists advised young people to be themselves—that’s the best way they can bring value to their firms, to their families, and to themselves.
“When you get your opportunity, you have to be the best version of yourself,” Goodrich said. “Be true to who you are.” Aretha Franklin would not have been the star she became, had she decided to sing like Rosemary Clooney or the Andrews Sisters, he said. “Bring your unique experiences, your perspective.”
Celebrating Black History Month
