Bob Faith

Within days of Commercial Observer’s early April interview with Bob Faith, the National Multifamily Housing Council released its annual ranking of the nation’s top apartment owners. No. 1 on the list? Greystar. 

The Charleston, S.C.-based company that Faith founded in 1993 owned 108,566 units as of Jan. 1, a good 8,000 units ahead of the next biggest owner and about 9,000 more than Greystar owned 12 months earlier. Greystar was also the largest U.S. apartment manager with 798,272 units, according to the NMHC — an astounding 500,000-plus more than the next largest manager. Greystar was also the biggest multifamily developer, having had 9,151 units under development in 2023. 

The man at the center of it all is kind of sanguine about throwing up such numbers. “We’ve been the largest operator of apartments in the U.S. for probably 10 years now,” Faith said. 

About three-fourths of Greystar’s business remains in U.S. multifamily. But it’s expanded by both geography and asset in the past several years. That includes more in Europe, East Asia and Australia. It also includes a burgeoning credit business and warehouse line. In the end, though, Faith has, well, faith in sustained demand for housing. So that remains the company’s raison d’etre in different forms — active adult, build to rent, student housing, but mostly multifamily. 

To that end, in May 2023, the company rolled out what it called Ltd. by Greystar. It’s an unfolding attempt to fill the “missing middle” in housing between higher-
end new development and government-subsidized affordable housing, Faith said. Greystar keeps the construction and operating costs low through technology that can streamline services and leasing as well as targeted, easily replicable designs. Greystar is also turning out some units modularly at a plant in York, Pa. The company had built 708 Ltd. units as of April 17. 

As for any threat from apartment overload — again, the head of America’s largest residential landlord and manager isn’t worried.

“We’ve been in this business 35-plus years and we know that this is a cyclical business,” Faith said. “You’re going to have moments in time where supply gets ahead of demand, but if you look at the sort of long-term fundamentals, there’s a lack of housing, really, in every major market in the world.”