Breaking Ceilings|Breaking Ground

What does it take to build the neighborhood you grew up in? For Sauda Ahmad-Green, it started with a law school exercise.

In this episode of Breaking Ceilings Breaking Ground, Molly McCabe and Jill Ferrari sit down with Sauda Ahmad-Green, Esq. Owner and principal of S&S Development Group in Detroit. Sauda builds mixed-income family housing in Virginia Park, the neighborhood where she grew up, and she's still there: family, friends, and neighbors who knew her as a child wave at her from the street.

Like many of the women we've talked with, Sauda became a developer by chance. In her third year of law school, an exercise in Real estate transactions course became real when Sauda asked herself how she'd actually practice title clearing. She took her savings and tried it on a burned-out building in her childhood neighborhood that had sat on the city's demolition list for twenty years, untouched because it was owned by ten different entities. Clearing the title took six months. Suddenly, Sauda owned the building and the letters started arriving from the City: do something with this building it's falling down.

Her opportunity came from a woman at a community bank with one Detroit branch. She saw Sauda's savings as equity and proof of intent, pushed a construction loan through. She also named the work Sauda was doing: "Did you know this is the work that our developers do." Sauda's reply: "No, I didn't know that." Sometimes it takes someone else to put out a hand to start. "She took a chance on me."

Merrill Place I was completed in 2010. Merrill Place II took a decade (through all sorts of travails, including COVID) because the pre-recession funding sources no longer existed and she had to find another way. It turns out, as a a naturally occurring mixed-income model at 60–120% AMI, Merrell I was the model.

Also in this episode:

• The gap funding crisis: plenty of senior financing exists, but in neighborhood development you almost always hit a gap. "Twenty, thirty percent of my stack: those funding sources no longer exist."
• Geothermal as a free utility: Merrill Place II doesn't bill heating and cooling to tenants. "For me, sustainability means equitable application of sustainability to all. If it doesn't benefit everyone, then it's not sustainable."
• The design test: "Would I live here? Would I want my mother to live here? My grandmother?" And why every two-bedroom unit has two full bathrooms.
• The Kamala Harris tour: Sauda hosted the former Vice President at Merrill Place II. "No, I want to see everything. Show me." Before leaving, Harris acknowledged her impact. "To know that I'm doing good work, and that it is seen, and that it's needed."
• Her advice, "Don't wait to have it figured out. If it's on your heart, just start. Because the development is in the learning process."

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/saudaahmadgreen/
• Website: sdevelopco.com

Sauda is assembling the capital stack for Merrill Place phases III and IV, roughly 60 more units, bringing the project to about 100 total.

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What do a recurring childhood dream and a bulldozer have to do with building community wealth? Everything, if you're Dr. Gina Merritt.

In this episode of Breaking Ceilings Breaking Ground, Molly McCabe and Jill Ferrari sit down with Dr. Gina Merritt, MBA: Founder and Principal of Northern Real Estate Urban Ventures (NREUV) in Washington, D.C. Gina grew up in affordable housing in the Bronx, lost her mother at thirteen, and helped raise three younger siblings. At sixteen, a conversation with her father set her on the road to independence.

On Wall Street she found a pure meritocracy and loved it. But business school changed the question: she no longer wanted to make rich people richer. She sent a résumé to D.C. thinking she was applying to a general contractor. It turned out to be a development opportunity. Asked what would excite her about the job, her answer was immediate: "If I could build neighborhoods like the one I grew up in. I grew up in affordable housing."

Then came the bulldozer. From roughly age seven to fifteen, Gina had a recurring dream, two or three times a week, of a bulldozer chasing her. On the first day of her first development job, she pulled up to a twelve-acre site, saw the bulldozer, and started crying in her car, not from fear, but from recognition. "My God, this is what I was supposed to do." She'd never seen one in real life. She grew up among thirty-story buildings.

Her central concept, formalized during her doctorate, is social capital, leveraging trusted relationships to connect people to opportunity. And when the job isn't enough, her team becomes the safety net. Sustainability, in her definition, is whether a person's life can hold together long enough to reach the opportunity in front of them.

Also in this episode:

• Mary's House for Older Adults: the nation's first communal affordable housing for LGBTQ+ older adults.
• The 2020 inflection: after twenty years of hearing no, Goldman Sachs and Capital Impact Partners funded her first ownership projects. "What these investors and lenders were underwriting was not my balance sheet. It was my experience."
• The $1 billion goal: $1B in assets under management by 2034.
• Ground Up, launching December 1, a learning community teaching development at minimal cost. "If I could do it, a little girl from the Bronx, anybody could do it."
• Know your numbers: "I don't think you're a true owner-developer unless you know how to run your own financial model."

Connect with Dr. Gina Merritt

• Website: drginamerritt.net
• Ground Up wait list: community.drginamerritt.net
• Volunteer with Project Community Capital: projectcommunitycapital.net
• NREUV: nreuv.com

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What if the best preparation for a career in development was never having a five-year plan at all?

In this episode of Breaking Ceilings Breaking Ground, Molly McCabe and Jill Ferrari sit down with Ashley Terry, President of Development at Pivot Project in Oklahoma City. Ashley's path into real estate was anything but traditional: she started out as a hairdresser before a single book changed the direction of her life.

Ashley leads development strategy and execution across Pivot's portfolio, with a focus on urban infill, mixed-use, and adaptive reuse in downtown Oklahoma City. Her work spans hospitality, historic rehabilitation, retail, housing, and public-private infrastructure. But she's less interested in isolated projects than in what she calls "building pieces of a city": the ten interdependent parts that all have to work together to make a place function.

It's a generalist's superpower, and Ashley leans all the way into it. In the course of a single day she might move from historic tax credits to re-tenancy to horizontal infrastructure, connecting dots that usually live in separate conversations.

Before Pivot, Ashley spent more than a decade at Wheeler District, a 150-acre urban infill project in Oklahoma City. She joined in a flexible "do whatever needed to be done" role and grew into Vice President of Development, with work spanning placemaking, entitlements, infrastructure, vertical development, operations, and strategy. Watching a project evolve from an empty field into a neighborhood where people live, work, and gather gave her a rare feedback loop: and taught her that small decisions have a long tail.

She also shares one of the best stories in the episode: a small playground placed between a restaurant and a brewery that turned into a family epicenter, with friends driving 30 minutes from the suburbs just to use the patio. The idea came from a 2017 team trip to Copenhagen, where the team biked the city and observed how families were woven into everyday public life.

Ashley defines sustainability in a way that will stick with you: does a project actually work over time? Can a building adapt to a second- or fourth-generation user? Can it remain financially and operationally sound long after the original development team is gone?

She also tells the story of Western Gateway Elementary School: handed an idea in 2017 with no education background and told to make it happen. She broke ground in March 2020, navigated charter authorization and curriculum-driven design decisions (restrooms in every classroom, for starters), and calls it her favorite project because she could see children learning in the finished building.

Throughout the conversation, Ashley keeps returning to a people-first lens shaped by Jan Gehl's Life Between Buildings and Jane Jacobs. Developers create the framework for community, she says: but they can't manufacture it. The best work leaves room for people to make a place their own.

• Email: [email protected]
• Website: pivotproject.com
• LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/ashleynterry

Pivot Project is actively seeking partners: architects, lenders, and investors for its development pipeline.

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What does it take to build a retail-first development platform in one of the fastest-growing markets in the country? For Elam Freeman, it starts with knowing who the customer is: because she is one of them.

In this episode of Breaking Ceilings Breaking Ground, Molly McCabe and Jill Ferrari speak with Elam Freeman, Nashville native and founder of Ojas Partners, a retail-focused commercial real estate advisory firm serving greater Nashville and surrounding markets. Elam also launched an investment venture in 2025 that sponsors deals in the neighborhoods she knows best.

Elam's path into commercial real estate was anything but linear. She studied political science, expected to work in social services, and taught yoga on the side to pay bills during her commission-only early years. When she entered the industry a decade ago, she describes feeling like a fish out of water culturally: but instead of retreating, she ran at the problem. That choice shaped her career philosophy: stand up, buy in, and break ground.

At Ojas Partners, Elam and her team of about ten brokers serve as "the advocate for the retail in the room" on mixed-use projects. They come in early to help developers program retail space so it attracts the right tenants, then carry projects through lease-up. The firm has brought brands such as Equinox and Sweetgreen to Nashville while also helping local businesses grow from one location into many.

Elam explains why retail strategy is a development function, not just a leasing function: and why securing commercial tenants can help mixed-use projects reach closing with more stable income streams. She also shares her approach to neighborhood merchandising: coordinating retail across a corridor so a district feels cohesive rather than piecemeal, because a rising tide lifts all ships.

Now moving from LP investments to GP sponsorship, Elam is candid about her goal of getting more women and more first-time investors into private real estate. She discusses accessibility, walking before you run, and why she operates with an abundance mindset: "When you get the right people in the room, one plus one equals three."

She also makes the case for AI as a force multiplier: not a replacement for judgment: and explains her plan to bring in an "AI architect" to connect marketing, accounting, and operations into one cohesive platform.

Connect with Elam Freeman

• LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/elamfreeman : messaging is the best way to reach her

Elam is actively seeking capital partners for Nashville deals, from institutional groups to friends-and-family opportunities, and welcomes listeners interested in investing alongside a female sponsor.

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What does it take to bring a nearly century-old building back to life after more than 20 years of vacancy? For Ronita Coleman, the answer is persistence, alignment, and a commitment to building for future generations.

In this episode of Breaking Ceilings Breaking Ground, Molly McCabe and Jill Ferrari speak with Ronita Coleman, co-founder of LJ Golden Realty in Metro Detroit. Ronita shares the story behind Casa del Rey, a historic building in Pontiac, Michigan, being transformed into a 54-unit apartment community for middle-income and working-class residents earning approximately 60%–120% of area median income.

With the project nearing its ribbon cutting, Ronita reflects on the challenges of restoring a complex, long-vacant property—and why she and her husband believed Casa del Rey needed a solution they could help provide.

Ronita’s path to development began alongside a 24-year career at General Motors. She and her husband started by fixing and flipping foreclosed homes, then shifted to buy-and-hold investments after becoming parents. After acquiring approximately eight to ten single-family homes on Detroit’s east side, they recognized that commercial real estate offered the scale needed to multiply their impact.

The transition was not easy. A first commercial deal fell apart at the closing table, but Ronita kept the property and treated the experience as an education rather than a defeat. Her philosophy is clear: every challenge teaches you how to handle the next one.

Ronita also discusses the lived experiences that shape her approach to development—including her retired parents, her late grandmother who lived independently until age 86 despite being blind, and a cousin who uses a wheelchair. Accessibility, affordability, walkability, “busability,” and dignity are not abstract concepts in her work. They are essential measures of a quality home and community.

• LinkedIn: Search for Ronita Coleman
• Facebook: Search for LJ Golden Realty
• Instagram: Search for LJ Golden Realty

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Ellen Buckley believes the next frontier in real estate isn't a building technology. It's understanding people.

Ellen is founder and CEO of Prospera Real Estate Collective, where she's led over $6 billion in development across multifamily, workforce housing, mixed-use, hospitality, and master-planned communities in the Midwest, Northeast, Southeast, and Asia. She started in the industry at fourteen, transferring deeds at her grandfather's law firm. By seventeen, she was the only woman on an all-male framing crew. Today, she's applying neuroscience and human behavior research to how communities get built.

In this episode, Ellen talks about:

• Why she moved a workforce homeownership project forward through a partnership with a local church
• Community immersion: why she spent three days living in a North Miami neighborhood — and did it again in Coconut Grove — before finalizing a project
• Sapient urbanism, and what changes when developers study neuroscience and human behavior alongside site plans
• An independent study Prospera commissioned on workforce turnover costs in Miami-Dade County: $1.3 billion in a single year
• Why she treats sustainability as three things at once — economic, social, and environmental — not just green building standards
• Her advice for women moving into development: don't wait until you're not the only one in the room

Connect with Ellen: LinkedIn (Ellen Buckley) or [email protected]

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Belinda Watts: The Third Ascent

What happens when an accomplished architecture and design career becomes the foundation for an entirely new chapter?

In this episode of Breaking Ceilings Breaking Ground, Molly McCabe and Jill Ferrari speak with Belinda Watts, founding partner of Row Partners LLC, a certified woman-owned owner’s representative and project management firm serving clients across New York City and the tri-state area.

Belinda’s career has taken her from a sheep farm in Australia to Pratt Institute, innovative work in tensile and modular structures, and 25 years as a project director at Gensler. At 67, she launched Row Partners and began what she calls a “third ascent”—a new phase of entrepreneurship, development, and purposeful work.

Belinda explains how she acts as “the translator” between clients and the specialized language of construction, design, insurance, and real estate. She also shares her perspective on adaptive reuse, small-scale development, interior architecture, retail’s role in activating streets, and why well-cared-for spaces influence how people live and work.

Her advice for aspiring developers is refreshingly practical: development does not have to mean a ground-up, 25-unit project. A two-family or four-family property can offer the same essential lessons in acquisition, financing, renovation, property management, and stewardship.

Belinda also talks candidly about moving from the efficiency of a corporate structure to the challenges of building her own business—and the value of having big aspirations supported by small, achievable plans.

In this episode, we discuss:

• Belinda’s journey from rural Australia to New York’s design and development community
• Her 25-year career at Gensler
• The “translator” role of an owner’s representative
• Adaptive reuse and flagship retail projects
• Reclaiming retail frontage on 14th Street
• How retail helps activate streets and strengthen neighborhoods
• Interior architecture and the importance of “cared-for design”
• Small-scale development and renovating two- and four-family properties
• Launching Row Partners at age 67
• The “third ascent” and later-career entrepreneurship
• Building systems after leaving a large corporate firm
• Why aspiring big with small plans can create lasting momentum

Connect with Belinda Watts:

Row Partners LLC: https://rowpartnersllc.com
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/belinda-watts-220b9090

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Breaking Ceilings Breaking Ground celebrates the women shaping the future of real estate development across North America.

What happens when a structural engineer sees possibility where others see failure?

In this episode of Breaking Ceilings Breaking Ground, Molly McCabe and Jill Ferrari speak with Meghan Elliott, a licensed structural engineer, developer, and serial entrepreneur whose career was shaped by witnessing the destruction caused by the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake.

Meghan is the founder of New History and Jillpine, and co-founder of RevitalizeMN—three ventures connected by a shared mission: keeping historic buildings alive, useful, and connected to the communities around them.

She explains how the earthquake taught her to see buildings as structures that can “fall forward”—to fail, adapt, and return to service. That perspective now guides her work restoring some of the most challenging historic properties in Minnesota.

Her latest project, The Book Match, transformed a century-old sandstone schoolhouse in Sandstone, Minnesota, after a 45-year community effort to save the building. The project involved 17 capital sources, including five state agencies and two federal agencies. The Book Match is now fully leased, demonstrating the demand for thoughtful, community-centered workforce housing.

Meghan also shares the story of Leijona, her first development project—a former Duluth jail converted into housing while preserving original jail-cell bars to meet historic tax-credit requirements. Along the way, she discusses learning real estate finance by “making mistakes, making some big mistakes,” building an informal advisory board, and knowing when to ask people with skills she does not have for help.

• The 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake
• The idea of buildings “falling forward” into a new chapter
• Structural engineering, architecture, and the path to development
• Founding New History and launching Jillpine
• The 45-year community effort behind The Book Match & its 17-source capital stack
• Converting the former St. Louis County Jail into Leijona apartments
• Historic tax credits and the challenge of preserving character
• Learning real estate finance through experience (and mistakes)
• Building an informal advisory board & how it has benefited her work and career
• Perseverance, tenacity, and finding another route after hearing “no”

• The Book Match: https://www.thebookmatchsandstone.com
• Leijona: https://www.liveleijona.com
• Jillpine: https://www.jillpine.com
• New History: https://www.newhistory.com
• Meghan Elliott on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/meghan-e-elliott

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Episode Overview:
In this episode, we sit down with two visionary leaders who are redefining the built environment across North America. Marisol Chávez Valdés (Director of Real Estate Portfolio, Deltack) and Fabiola Alvarez Yurcisin (Director, ULI Terwilliger Center for Housing) join us to discuss how intentional design, community-first placemaking, and a "generosity of spirit" are transforming everything from industrial parks in Mexico to equitable housing policy in Washington, D.C.

From nearshoring in Mexico to the critical role of women in cross-border development, we explore why "profit and community impact" are not competing priorities, but two sides of the same calculation.

Key Topics:

• Defining Placemaking: Moving beyond industrial barriers to create human-centric, accessible spaces that serve the local community.
• The Power of Intentionality: How Deltack sets new standards for pedestrian infrastructure and public space integration in industrial developments.
• Resilience as a Superpower: Our guests share their personal stories of navigating motherhood, leadership, and finding authenticity in male-dominated spaces.
• The Dual-Lens Approach: How the intersection of art and urban planning helps leaders ask better questions and build more inclusive cities.
• Cross-Border Collaboration: Understanding the unique challenges and opportunities of housing and industrial development in the U.S.–Mexico corridor.

Guests:

• Marisol Chávez Valdés: Architect, urban designer, and Director of Real Estate Portfolio at Deltack, based in Monterrey, Mexico. Connect with her on LinkedIn.
• Fabiola Alvarez Yurcisin: Urban planner, systems thinker, and artist serving as Director at ULI's Terwilliger Center for Housing. Explore her art at fabiola.com.mx or reach out via LinkedIn.

Mentioned in this Episode:

• Urban Land Institute (ULI) Terwilliger Center for Housing
• Deltack’s approach to nearshoring and industrial development in Mexico
• The role of art in urban design and community engagement

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Keep breaking ceilings and breaking ground!

In this episode, Molly and Jill sit down with Shellan Rodriguez, the founder of SMR Development. With over 20 years of experience spanning the public, private, and nonprofit sectors, Shellan has built a reputation for being the "bridge" between two worlds: the high-stakes world of market-rate development and the mission-critical world of affordable housing.

Shellan’s journey is a masterclass in pragmatism. After her own mother (a social worker) told her she’d be a terrible social worker because she was "too practical," Shellan found her calling in real estate—a way to impact lives without getting lost in the "messiness of humanity." From rural Idaho to the Eastern Sierra, Shellan is proving that you don't need a real estate dynasty behind you to build a legacy.

• Pragmatism Over Ideology: Why Shellan chooses affordable and attainable housing because it allows her to "feel good about today and make a living at the same time."
• The Translator Superpower: How she brings market-rate developers into the affordable space by speaking both "profit" and "permit."
• Closing Deals from the Park Bench: A glimpse into the life of a multitasking founder—closing a major deal on her laptop while helping her son catch his first fish.
• Real Estate Without a Safety Net: Shellan talks about building a company without a family real estate background or a financial "catch-all" if she falls.
• The Power of "I Don't Know": Why she values the Women’s Development Collaborative (WDC) as a safe space to ask the the questions and get clear answers trusted peers and colleagues.
• Vetting the Partner: Her practical advice on structuring partnerships and finding the right guarantors when you’re building from the ground up.

• SMR Development: www.smrdevelopment.com
• Women’s Development Collaborative (WDC): www.wdc-online.org
• Contact Shellan: Reach out for Idaho and Nevada project partnerships via her website.