For Alexis Dunfee, affordable housing has always been personal.
As a child, her family struggled with housing stability, at one point leaving Dunfee and her brothers living with different relatives. Moving together into an affordable three-bedroom project-based Section 8 home in Port Clinton, Ohio, changed that. Dunfee still remembers the feeling: Her family had finally “made it.”
Years later, that experience continues to shape the work Dunfee, 38, does at Wallick, where she has risen from a development apprentice to a senior vice president of development, helping to create the same kind of stability for other families.
“I’ve been really fortunate to have found a company that aligns with some of the things that are so important to me and how I got to be me,” she says. “And Wallick’s been a home where I’ve just been able to nurture doing more for those that need that kind of lift and support. So that’s the why behind why I keep fighting the good fight every day.”
Ohio-based Wallick continues to increase its pipeline. In 2021, the development team typically carried five to six active projects at a time. In 2026, with Dunfee serving as senior vice president for three years, the active workload has nearly doubled to 11 projects. To date, Dunfee has participated in the development of more than 4,000 units. She has been a leader for her team in other product types, like workforce housing and affordable assisted living, and she helped Wallick open its first affordable housing community in North Carolina and its first senior living community outside of Ohio in Michigan.
Her impact extends beyond development. She is a founding member of Wallick’s Heart of Service volunteer committee, which has coordinated opportunities for associates to receive a paid day off for volunteering for different community causes.
What did your last project teach you?
That I’m not the smartest person in the room. I just know how to get the right people together to do the right thing.
What do you find most rewarding about your job?
It’s the challenge met with creativity, and that being an ongoing loop. Every project’s an opportunity for us to evolve to be better, smarter, and sharper on the work that we do.
If you could share one lesson with someone just starting their career in affordable housing, what would it be?
One of the things I tell those that join our organization often is to relax. You're not going to learn it today. It’s going to take a long time, and if you haven’t asked the same question eight times, chances are you don’t really understand and know what it is that we’re really saying. This is a niche business. It takes patience. It takes time. It takes diligence. It takes relationships. Don’t get overwhelmed at the get-go because you’ll get there.
What's one thing people would be surprised to learn about you?
I think I’m a much better cook than maybe people would think. I really enjoy cooking everything—from open-pit barbecue to rolling out my own noodles and making pasta.
What does affordable housing mean to you?
It’s been everything for my family. It’s been everything for my ability to be who I am today, and it is the thing that makes me wake up every morning in my role and my position to be able to effectuate more affordable housing. It is something I think about a lot, and I’ve just been really fortunate to be in an era at the micro level where I can share what I’ve learned, what I know, and who I know for more people on my team to do the same or more or better work than I ever did on my own. At a macro level, it’s to be at a place where it seems like we have the space and the platform to really talk earnestly about what affordable housing is and why it matters so much to our neighbors and our friends and those in our community. It really is a refreshing place to be on the development side to be doing affordable housing because I think people are getting more engaged. They are understanding why what we're doing is so important, and I would have said even five years ago that that was not necessarily the case. I’ve been in moments where I’ve been in a community meeting with people with pitchforks, if you will, saying we don’t want you to now a dynamic of how do we help you make this happen. And that’s really a gamechanger for those who are trying to make it happen on the development side. But I think affordable housing is my passion. It’s what the world needs more of. And again, I’m just fortunate to be where I am.