During construction, you and the developer will work on a plan for the lease-up and management of the building. Your Joint Venture Agreement should outline who has ownership of the property when it’s finished, including who is responsible for property management. Most often, churches and developers use a contracted partner for property management because there is a lot of compliance to consider, and most churches don’t have the bandwidth or expertise to add a property management arm permanently. Utilizing an outside property manager also allows the church to remain removed from the more challenging elements of property management such as evictions.

However, you can still have a presence in the building. There are many models for church engagement in apartment communities. Just Homes Neighbor Teams can help your tenants move in and provide relational community support as the residents adjust to their new home (more on that in the Serve section of this resource). Apartment Life places people into apartment buildings to intentionally build community within the building and demonstrate the love of Christ to their neighbors. If you’re serving specialized populations with your housing, consider built in social services like those provided by Jubilee Housing.

House of Lebanon is managed by an external property management company, but Pastor Edmonds and his church are still present in the community on a regular basis, holding events in the community space and frequently engaging with residents. Emory Beacon of Light (Emory Fellowship’s CDC) is a 50% owner of the building and operates businesses out of the building, but their development partner TCB handles all property management duties.

Or, your church could completely remove itself once the building is done. What works best for your church? Just Homes can help you decide. Whatever it is, be clear about those expectations from the beginning.