The [Urban Core] Housing Donut Dilemma
Why 97.2% Of All Housing Is Produced OUTSIDE The Urban Core Of Kansas City, MO
Housing in Kansas City’s Urban Core (and urban cores across the country) is like waiting in a long line at Lamar’s Donuts…
Only to discover it’s missing its most critical element.
Picture this:
It’s your cheat day.
You’ve been thinking about grabbing donuts all week. The smell hits you from blocks away — warm, sweet, fresh. Everything about this moment tells you: they must be baking like crazy inside.
You pull up to Lamar’s and the line is wrapped around the block. People are excited. Hungry. Hopeful.
Your park your car and rush to the line in Christmas Eve anticipation!
10 minutes pass — the line barely moves. 20 minutes — folks start to leave. By 35 minutes, half the line walks back to their cars.
But you stay. Because through the window you see a full staff inside — people moving fast, aprons on, trays in hand, energy everywhere.
Finally, you walk inside…
…and that’s when you realize something is deeply wrong.
The staff is working. The line was long. The smell is perfect.
But the shop is missing something extremely critical:
No oven
No dough
No mixer
No bowls
No trays
No kitchen equipment at all
Just two and a half donuts on a lonely display rack:
One fresh donut
One stale donut
One half-eaten donut
Not because they sold out — but because they never had the capacity to make more.
You’re shocked. You walk up to the cashier and ask:
“Where the heck are the donuts?”
She doesn’t hesitate:
“Oh, those? They’re 20 minutes away at our other locations. We don’t actually make donuts here — we just pump out the smell. All the production happens at our suburban locations. Make sure to follow us on IG!”
No one was walking out with donuts. They were walking out empty-handed.
And suddenly the whole scene makes sense:
The long line wasn’t proof of booming business —
it was proof of broken production.
Since 2019 - 97.2% of New Single Family Homes in the KC Metro are built outside the urban core of KCMO.
This is Kansas City’s Housing Donut Dilemma.
Inside that red square:
60,000 families live there.
16,500 could afford to buy TODAY.
The demand is enormous.
The need is urgent.
The energy is real.
But the core is missing something extremely critical:
Actual production capacity.
A real kitchen.
A New Housing Infrastructure…
that efficiently produces more new quality homes, to make housing more affordable, where working families already live.
Here’s what that “kitchen” looks like today:
60 total single-family homes were permitted in 2024.
191 homes is the max annual production since 2019.
We’re on pace for only 55 in 2025.
The Urban Core needs a real kitchen — a true production system that works together.
KCMO Jackson County - Urban Core - Produces only 2.8% of all new homes across the metro since 2019.
(The housing equivalent of two donuts and a half-eaten one.)
Meanwhile, the donut ring around the city produces 97.2% of everything.
And because the core has no “kitchen,” the few homes that appear become ultra-rare and unaffordable:
One Fresh Donut — New builds at $525,000
One Stale Donut — Existing homes at $350,000
½ Eaten Donut — Anything “affordable” requires subsidy, grants, or miracles
16,500 families = $5.7 BILLION in real, ready-to-buy demand sits waiting in line… with nothing to purchase.
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The Real Dilemma
Pumping out smells is frustrating — endless planning committees, task forces, roundtables, reports. Recruiting new “fancy bakeries” from other cities doesn’t fix it — they weren’t built for these neighborhoods or these families. And nobody needs 3D-printed pastries or the latest gimmick.
What the urban core needs is kitchen equipment — actual production capacity — in the neighborhoods where families already live.
When the oven is finally in the right place:
the shelves fill
the prices stabilize
the line moves
families finally get the homes they’ve been waiting for
KC doesn’t have a demand problem. KC has a Donut Dilemma — and it’s missing something extremely critical.
————————
A Call to Action: Help Us Build the Kitchen
We’re not waiting on someone else to solve this.
We’ve assembled an established team committed to producing housing in the urban core — the exact places where no one else cares to go.
We’ve already secured $13.9 million in funding commitments to make this possible. We’ve broken ground on the first homes. We understand the recipe. We know exactly what the kitchen requires.
And now, we could use your capital to unlock the $13.9M to finish building the kitchen.
We offer:
Tax-sheltered investment options
Or a clear path to financial returns
Impact measured not only in cash, but in families settled and neighborhoods stabilized
If this goes well, our network already includes enough land to build 500 homes — right where families actually live, work, and raise their children.
Message me if you want to help build a new kitchen for housing production in Kansas City’s urban core.
Together, we can finally move from the smell of possibility to the reality of production.
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