“I’m in the process of selling my house [to the current tenants]. That house was literally almost three years of blood, sweat, and tears, and every penny I had in order to renovate it. It was my first house out of a dozen houses I’ve bought in New Orleans. It set off so much for me in life. I met my wife through buying that house, I’ve grown that into a really nice little real estate thing, and I learned a million lessons there.”
“So, why are you selling it?”
“Just saying goodbye to the house and putting it on the market and selling it to some stranger for the highest price you can get was not what I wanted to see for this house. But the people in that house are such good people - they’re perennial renters - if I [put that house on the market], those people aren’t going to be in the neighborhood anymore. The truth is, a lot of tenants have what we say is ‘no visible means of support.’ They don’t have a fucking job, you know? But they pay the rent every month and they’re awesome people. I live in an amazing, funky, fun, artistic, creative [neighborhood and] city, and I’m not really very interesting or artistic or creative myself. But the way I feel that I can contribute is making sure that those people have a place to live, you know, that they’re not pushed out of the neighborhood. That’s my contribution.“
