Real estate and privilege

I’m a white male and I work in real estate.

Real estate is where the vast majority of the world’s wealth is stored, yet for so many people they have no access to it.

They don’t have access to it because a capitalist system needs winners and losers.

It needs to cheap labor and abundant natural resources.

It creates a culture that glories financial aggrandizement yet turns a blind eye towards genuine wealth.

People of color and minorities in the US have had the deck stacked against them for so many generations it’s hard to comprehend how to overcome such an oppressive system.

My work trying to promote regenerative real estate has led me to the perspective that social, environmental, and economic justice are all one big ball of wax.

Regenerative real estate at times feels like an oxymoron since the industry has commodified nature, land, and home.

Five years ago a property management company I started was investigated for racial discrimination.

No wrong doing was found (you can read investigation details and findings here), but the shame of that investigation was immense.

Despite the findings the lawyers still tried to go after insurance money and create case law out of the company.

There we were a small company trying to do the best we could meanwhile feeling like we were being used as a pawn in a larger game we didn’t know we were a part of.

Corporations, meanwhile, are buying up everything from rental housing to mobile home parks.

Investors love it because it drives a high return on their capital.

Banks love it because it creates demand for debt, which in turn creates money.

A few people get wealthy. Many more get poor.

We decry income inequality and homelessness yet don’t dare change the tax code.

It seems minority leaders are calling for equal access. But is equal access to participate in a broken system the end game?

I don’t feel like I have the authority or understanding to comprehend the answer to that question.

I have few answers at this point in my understanding; only questions.

What will be the catalyst for the transformation of the broken system?

How can we transform the system together?

How can everyone have access to land in order to form a relationship to place?

How can everyone have access to clean water and healthy food to nourish the body, the mind, and the soul?

How can everyone have access to financial literacy so that we do not become enslaved to debt?

How can all people have access to credit to purchase their own homes?

How does reparation happen for past injustices?

How do we live without guilt or judgement for our skin colors, our genders, or our sexual preferences?

These are the generative questions that I think would lead to a new culture. Hopefully a culture that is not so ready to cast judgement and blame or use the oppressive tools of shame and hate.

This is where I see the linkage between regeneration and social justice.

Palo Freire calls education a revolutionary tool.

We’ve paved over the very life source of the planet and have left large parcels of land neglected. People are worried about hunger yet don’t have the ecological literacy to see the potential beneath their feet.

Someone once told me that gardening was only for the affluent, yet for many people I’ve witnessed around the world, the growing of food is done out of necessity, passion, and purpose.

If the goal is to heal ourselves, regenerate the land, transform the culture, empower the oppressed, and springboard biodiversity, then I’m in 110%. If it’s to perpetuate a broken system so that more people can degrade the land, pollute the environment, and poison themselves then I don’t feel so good about the the purpose.

This is where I see the deeper purpose for Regenerative real estate. What is needed before any outward action is a safe place where people from communities across the globe can talk about these issues, explore their own inner programming and life experiences, and equip themselves to create the change needed in the outer world.

What I’ve learned so far is that this is a process. It’s messy and can feel painfully slow. Time is the critical ingredient yet it feels like there is no time to waste.

Mary Reynolds says that healing of ourselves and our culture is much harder by solely focusing on our human selves. We heal ourselves when we heal the land.

We heal the land when we stop treating it as a commodity.

We stop treating it as a commodity when we stop seeing the system as one that we can’t change.

This starts with seeing the system for what it is in the first place — a system that is inherently racist and sexist and skewed toward privilege.

I know that because of my gender, race, and privilege, I benefit from the system as it is.

I am working on anti-racism and inner transformation. I am making it a part of my life’s work.

I am a Latitude Change Agent. Latitude is integrating anti-racism into our organizational culture. We are looking for allies to work with us and collaborate on this path.

We have many questions about how we, as people of privilege, can leverage our privilege to evolve the system to benefit marginalized communities and all life.

It feels painfully slow to do this work. People have gotten frustrated and have even tried to use our past company’s investigation against us. But we march on, convicted to be a catalyst for change and a strong desire to get it right.