Kansas City real estate agent has a lofty goal of helping 1,000 black people buy their own homes

A Kansas City real estate agent aims to help black people buy their own homes.

Tenesia Brown, CEO of Keys Realty Group, is inching closer to her 1,000-person milestone. She wants to inform starters about how they can actually realize this American dream.

“Why not?” she said KSHB. “We have a big gap in the number of people becoming homeowners, and that’s only because we lack education and don’t know where to find the resources.”

Since she started her business, she has helped 887 new Black homeowners. Many come to her because they want to join the business, especially as renting becomes unfeasible.

Shay Moore also joined the cause and dismantled the barriers that keep black people from owning homes. The radio station host decided to take on the initiative after her own periods of living in multiple cities and not having a place to call her own.

“I’ve lived in six different states and worked at eleven radio stations, so I never thought about buying a house until now,” says Moore.

However, Moore noticed how the current market has made renting homes unaffordable and undesirable.

“When I first came here, I had a three-bedroom townhome in Lee’s Summit, and it was affordable,” she said. ‘Not anymore. Things have really gotten out of hand.”

Now that she wants to start her own home, she wants to encourage others to do the same.

“One of my concerns was the interest rate at some point and the price,” she said. “What I found in Kansas City is that you can still get affordable housing.”

Like Moore and other clients, Brown wants to inspire weary renters to travel beyond rental properties to secure their own place. However, she does this in a difficult climate marked by high interest rates and a shaky labor market.

According to the National Association of ‘Realtors’ 2025 “Snapshot of the race and home buying in America“While Black homeownership remains relatively stable, it still lags behind white Americans. The Black homeownership rate is at 43.9%, down from last year’s 44.7%, while the white homeownership rate is around 74%.

With homeownership in general on a dip, reaching a record low of 21%, Moore remains committed to breaking the tides, even in the face of new obstacles. Her efforts start with reaching aspiring homeowners where they are financially so that, if the opportunity arises, they can stay in their new property.

“You have to start where you can afford it,” Brown added. “You can’t be rich in your home and poor in your pocket.”

She expects to reach her goal by 2026, thanks to her small but mighty wave of Black homeowners.

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