Dana Christian has over twenty years of senior executive experience in the affordable housing industry with a successful track record in the development of affordable housing. Ms. Christian is a well-established as a leader in the local and regional community development industries.
After receiving her Masters in Business Administration from the University of Detroit Mercy, Dana began her career in the corporate world of a Fortune 500 corporation, EDS, but soon realized that she could affect change in her community by dedicating her career to housing and neighborhood redevelopment.
Dana accepted an opportunity at North Star Community Development Corporation to restructure a failing community service program. Her success in that effort grew into her responsibility of developing and operating many resident service programs spanning the areas of employment training, job development and youth activities drawing on her experience as a substitute teacher while completing her graduate degree. Her skills and talents quickly propelled her to senior management with a new focus on community based real estate development.
As a well-respected community development practitioner in the Detroit area, her most noted accomplishments are in the area of affordable housing development. Her introductory experiences as a housing developer resulted in the production of 148 units of new construction housing for the communities that she served. Gaining a strong understanding of affordable housing tools such as the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit program, HOME and others, she has been responsible for every aspect in the creation of affordable housing such as concept design, land acquisition, financial packaging and asset management. Being considered a high producer of nonprofit housing developments, she was asked to design and implement a faith-based housing development training program for churches interested in the creation of affordable housing.
Dana shifted her affordable housing focus to transforming dilapidated public housing into attractive mixed income, mixed financed and mixed type communities. She was invited to join the national program management team for the redevelopment of the former Jeffries projects that had long been one of the most undesirable housing sites in the city. Her more recent redevelopment experience using the Rental Assistance Demonstration Program has assisted more than 300 families and counting, with over 2000 units of rental housing developed throughout her career. These experiences have provided Dana with a solid foundation in real estate development that involves all types of housing, rental, for sale, senior, affordable, market rate, single family and multifamily.
Remaining dedicated to her hometown, Dana serves as the Executive Director of New Hope Community Development NPHC while continuing to affect change in the public housing redevelopment industry as the Development Manager to housing authorities and developers conducting affordable housing in Indiana, Illinois, North Carolina and Michigan.