The Dallas Company Fighting Housing Discrimination One Home at a Time

High Opportunity Neighborhood Partners believes it can make money and serve voucher holders by providing them with a quality home.

By Will Maddox

Housing developer Matthew Berke wanted to know why many landlords were reluctant to rent to voucher recipients. So he asked them. They complained about tenants not taking care of the property. They said it was a headache to work with housing authorities to get their rent each month. Berke says he was skeptical. And he also saw an opportunity—he believed he could help working families and still run a successful company. He trained his eye to the suburbs.

“We discovered that tenants are not marauding folks bent on destruction,” he says. “They are often single moms wanting to raise kids in a good school district. These Section 8 tenants want better schools, and I think that is a human right.”

Berke is the founder of High Opportunity Neighborhood Partners, or HON, which buys single family homes and rents them solely to voucher holders. The company bought its first property in April 2019 and has since purchased over 250 more in seven cities, about half of which are in the suburbs of North Texas. 

HON has a goal to increase housing stock for these families, choosing homes that are in good shape, priced well, and located near solid school districts. These are mostly three- and four-bedroom residences, targeted specifically at families who are often forced to live in apartments in segregated neighborhoods with higher crime and poverty rates...

Read the full length article as published in D Magazine.