Cécile Chalifour
Managing director and head of West region community development banking at JPMorgan Chase
Cécile Chalifour has helped accelerate JPMorgan’s commitment to producing new affordable housing units on the West Coast.
The region of JPMorgan’s community development banking (CDB) arm that Chalifour has led out of Los Angeles since 2017 executed $2.3 billion in affordable housing financing in 2022 from more than 60 deals. The active 2022 compares with prior typical years from CDB that would involve roughly from $500 million to $600 million in affordable housing volume from around 30 transactions.
“What this shows is a huge commitment from the firm to do more affordable housing,” Chalifour said. “We are really committed to providing the capital and the tools needed to do all the affordable housing we can.”
Chalifour attributed the spike in creating more affordable housing in the West in large part to a new California Housing Accelerator program, which provides bridge financing for shovel-ready projects unable to commence construction due to a shortage of federal tax credits and bonds.
She noted that over the course of 2022 and 2023, JPMorgan facilitated 18 affordable housing projects under this program with $955 million in construction financing.
One of the L.A.-area projects that Chalifour helped achieve financing for under California Accelerator was Liberty Lane, an 80-unit complex in Redlands, Calif., geared toward veterans with physical challenges or without a home.
“This is a really aggressive program in terms of underwriting, and most of the big banks couldn’t get behind it,” Chalifour said of California Accelerator. “When we saw this new program coming in, even though it’s really challenging to underwrite it as a bank, we did it.”
In the year ahead, Chalifour wants to continue to ramp up affordable housing across the Western U.S. as part of JPMorgan’s racial equity commitment.
Outside of JPMorgan, Chalifour is actively involved in a number of groups, including as a board member for the California Community Reinvestment Corporation and on the board of governors of the California Housing Consortium.
When not tackling the nation’s affordable housing challenges, Chalifour, a native of France, enjoys taking advantage of California’s numerous hiking trails in addition to traveling and reading.
“I love anything that will keep me enthusiastic about learning something,” she said. “My hobby is curiosity.”
