The project examines the effects of large investment firms pushing homeownership out of reach for many first-time buyers. The AJC has found that single-family houses have been snatched up in the thousands by private equity firms and publicly traded companies, converted into rental properties and bundled into complex investment vehicles.

Our thesis for this project

Across the Sun Belt, investment firms are extracting wealth where families normally build it: the single-family home.

Since the Great Recession, large investors have snapped up more than 65,000 homes in metro Atlanta and converted them to rentals. And the flood of Wall Street cash is pushing homeownership out of reach for many middle class families.

Investors buy in all but the wealthiest neighborhoods, but their homes are disproportionately found in African American communities.

Priced out of buying, families who wind up renting from these same firms can face deplorable conditions, exorbitant fees and frequent eviction filings by out-of-state landlords driven to maximize shareholder profits.

Metro Atlanta is ground zero for the investor takeover of the American Dream.

— BRIAN EASON

PUBLISHED TUESDAY, Feb. 14

Investors zero in on Black neighborhoods: Buy-to-rent push puts homeownership further out of reach in metro Atlanta.

PUBLISHED THURSDAY, Feb. 16

Investor homes spark neighborhood tensions: Homeowners clash with firms buying, building single-home rentals.

COMING SUNDAY, Feb. 19

Investors slam tenants with fees, evictions: Private equity makes big push into Atlanta’s single-family homes.

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