Recasting Real Estate

Sep 10, 2020

Portland Business Journal

Inside efforts to diversify the industry in Portland elsewhere.

Anyeley Hallová moved to Portland from Atlanta in 2007 and set out to land a job in real estate development. She had experience working as an urban designer and a stack of degrees to her name, including a master’s degree in city planning from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

What she didn’t have were any connections, which put her at a serious disadvantage in a city where job prospects frequently rest on who you know. She started cold calling companies and eventually secured a job at real estate firm Gerding Edlen after a higher up “gave me a chance,” she said.

Today, Hallová, who is Black, is a partner at development firm project^, where she works with Tom Cody, who hired her at Gerding Edlen. She's one of the few women of color to rise to a top leadership position at a real estate firm in Portland.

“We have the power in our industry to affect the environment, to affect people, to affect their welfare,” she said. “That’s what makes me excited about being in this. And I would love to see more people from diverse backgrounds that look like me, that come from all different walks of life, be able to influence the environment that we all live in.”