08/13/2026
For years, an abandoned shopping center sat just minutes from where T.I. grew up in Atlanta.
In 2023, that same property reopened with a completely different purpose: giving families and young people an affordable place to call home.
The rapper and entrepreneur joined developers and community partners to help create Intrada Westside, a housing development built on the site of the former Kmart shopping center on Donald Lee Hollowell Parkway.
The project created 143 affordable and workforce apartments, with 25 units specifically designated for young people experiencing homelessness.
For T.I., the location made the project deeply personal.
At the ribbon-cutting ceremony, he recalled buying candy at that same shopping center as a child. Decades later, he was standing there helping open homes for people in the community that raised him.
The development represents more than replacing an empty retail property with apartments.
It takes land that had lost its original purpose and puts it back to work for a neighborhood facing the very real pressure of rising housing costs.
T.I. built his career far beyond the streets where he grew up.
Then he returned to one of those familiar places and helped transform it into something his younger self could never have bought there:
a chance for 143 households to have a more affordable place to call home.
Source: City of Atlanta; Invest Atlanta; Atlanta Housing; Intrada Westside development reporting; FOX 5 Atlanta.
Disclaimer: Intrada Westside was developed through a broader partnership involving developers, public agencies, financing partners and community stakeholders. T.I. participated as an investor and partner and should not be characterized as solely financing or building all 143 apartments.