World We Dare to Imagine- Post 1
I always knew I was going to be an artist growing up. I would spend hours every day drawing the world I saw around me and the world I imagined. I would reimagine the house I lived in– designing new rooms and that you could only travel to through waterslides and secret portals.
I began taking art more seriously as I reached high school. I enrolled in an intensive program at the Rhode Island School of Design, where I fell in love with the intersection of design concepts, architecture, and urban design. From there, I knew I wanted to pursue design in college which led me to Roski, the school of art and design, at USC.
As a senior looking back with a job in real estate private equity lined up, I feel like I failed my childhood dream. After the first few weeks at Roski, I transferred to Marshall. It was a mix between not liking the classes and the second-generation immigrant guilt that led me into business. Despite putting art on the side as a hobby now, I found a new way to pursue my passion in urban planning and design through real estate. During my internship as a real estate analyst, I joined our ESG committee and worked closely on an affordable housing project that was also LEED certified, meaning it followed the framework as a highly efficient and cost-saving green building.
The first step to making the world a better place is to create equitable and sustainable housing and buildings. Every human being needs a space to live in and the US is far behind by about 5.5 million housing units over the past 20 years. The housing epidemic has only gotten worse with the pandemic and inflation. Along with making housing affordable, creating sustainable communities can drastically change the future of our planet. The building sector alone generates around 50% of annual global CO2 emissions. Small changes in design, urban planning, and sustainable alternatives can create a large impact on the environment.
Despite not living up to my artisitic dreams presently, I found a passion that really gives me motivation to continue down the path I'm going.
Hi Lucia - so great that you've found a career that is still able to address social needs while relieving you in some part from the second-generation immigrant guilt. It'll be really interesting to see what roles private equity can play in the real estate industry going forward - green buildings being less costly to operate, I'm sure the "green" designation is appealing from an ROI perspective.
ReplyDeleteHi Lucia, great post! I like how you were able to combine your passion with a career where you could positively impact a mission. I didn't even know that the building sector produces 50% of CO2 emissions so educating home buyers about this could be an important next step.
ReplyDeleteHey Lucia, your work may be different from what you originally had intended, but I'd argue that you're making an larger impact in your current role. It's crazy how far behind the country is in terms of housing units. I would think the next steps would most likely be passing some sort of local legislation funding the production of affordable housing projects.
ReplyDeleteHi Lucia, I really appreciated hearing about your journey from design to business, and how you have uncovered a new passion for real estate in the process! I too have recently learned more about the housing epidemic and believe that is a very pressing issue - particularly in Los Angeles. I would be interested to hear about what specific changes could be made to existing and new properties to make them more sustainable!
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