Building a Father Daughter Development Company

I grew up without a father in the home. My mother raised six children by herself in Section 8 public housing in Kansas City, Missouri. We lived in poverty, on welfare, bouncing between public housing projects including Holy Temple Homes and Friendship Village Apartments. There was no blueprint for what a father daughter business partnership could look like, because there was no father in the picture.

That is the context for understanding what The Nash Group represents to me. When Arielle and I built this company together, it was not just a business decision. It was the correction of a cycle. It was proof that the story does not have to repeat itself.

Arielle Nash is President and Co-Founder of The Nash Group. She watched me turn lived experience into lasting impact, and then she decided to build alongside me. That decision was hers. I did not ask her to join the family business. She chose it, and she came prepared.

Arielle is a Washington University graduate. She worked as a research analyst at Artemis Real Estate Partners before joining The Nash Group. She is fluent in Chinese and Spanish. She was named among Savoy Magazine's Most Influential Black Executives. She did not walk into this company on my name. She walked in with credentials, experience, and a perspective that complements mine in ways that make the firm stronger.

I have eight degrees. I have 35 years of experience. I chaired the Planning, Zoning, and Economic Development Committee on the Kansas City City Council. I served as Vice Chairman of the Missouri Housing Development Commission. I have been in rooms that most people never enter. But here is what I have learned about building a company: the person who built it is not always the best person to carry it forward.

Arielle brings a generational perspective that I cannot replicate. She understands the markets, the technology, and the stakeholders of tomorrow. Her training at Artemis Real Estate Partners gave her institutional investment experience. Her language skills open doors in international markets. Her generation communicates differently, networks differently, and sees opportunity in places that my generation sometimes overlooks.

A father daughter company works not because we agree on everything, but because we bring different strengths to the same mission. She challenges my assumptions. I provide the institutional knowledge and the relationships. Together, we cover more ground than either of us could alone.

People ask how we maintain the family relationship while running a company together. The honest answer is that the company is an extension of the relationship, not separate from it. The values that guide The Nash Group are the same values I tried to instill in my family long before there was a company.

When I was 25, I converted my mother's small house into a classroom. I bought used textbooks from the thrift store and tutored my three older brothers until they enrolled in college for the first time. My mother, at 55, studied for and received her GED with my help. When she passed away on March 15, 2003, she was a junior in college. UMKC posthumously awarded her a Bachelor's degree, and I accepted it on her behalf at commencement.

Education was the lever that changed my family's trajectory. That same conviction, that knowledge and opportunity can break cycles, is the foundation of the company Arielle and I run together. She grew up watching that conviction in action. Now she applies it every day.

The Nash Group operates across eight disciplines: affordable housing, deal structuring, real estate advisory, infrastructure consulting, urban planning, education and training, professional speaking, and expert witness services. That is a wide platform, and it requires leadership that can move between disciplines without losing focus.

My background in public service, law, urban planning, public health, and finance means I tend to lead on the deals that require navigating government agencies, structuring complex financing, and managing stakeholder relationships that were built over decades. Arielle's background in institutional real estate research and her generation's fluency with data, technology, and emerging markets means she strengthens our analytical capabilities and our ability to communicate with a broader audience.

We are building 254 or more affordable housing units across Kansas City and St. Louis, with over $100 million in total development costs. That portfolio exists because two generations are working on it simultaneously, each contributing what the other cannot.

The Nash Group is not a standalone company. It is the anchor of an ecosystem that includes AGI Affinity, our AI consulting firm that helps underserved communities close the digital divide, and The Nash Group Community Foundation, our 501(c)(3) nonprofit focused on breaking cycles and building futures. Arielle serves in leadership across the ecosystem.

This structure was intentional. The problems we are trying to solve, housing instability, health inequity, digital exclusion, and economic immobility, do not exist in isolation. They require an integrated approach. A father daughter partnership gives us the ability to lead across all three entities with shared values and a unified vision, while bringing two different generational perspectives to each one.

I grew up without a father. I know exactly what that absence costs. It costs stability. It costs confidence. It costs the simple knowledge that someone who looks like you has navigated the world successfully and is willing to show you how.

Building a company with my daughter is the most meaningful thing I have done in my career. Not because of the units we are building or the dollars we are deploying, but because it represents the opposite of what I experienced as a child. It is presence. It is partnership. It is the deliberate construction of something that will outlast both of us.

To other fathers considering working with their children: do not wait for the perfect moment. The perfect moment is the one where you decide to build something together. Bring your experience. Let them bring their perspective. Trust that the combination will be stronger than either part alone.

Where you start out in life has nothing to do with where you end up. That is true for individuals, and it is true for families. The Nash Group is living proof.

Dr. Troy Nash is CEO and Co-Founder of The Nash Group, LLC, CEO and Co-Founder of AGI Affinity, LLC, and Co-Founder of The Nash Group Community Foundation. Arielle Nash is President and Co-Founder of The Nash Group, LLC. Together they are building 254+ affordable housing units across Kansas City and St. Louis.