Kaufman & Company founder says workforce housing belongs in the site plan for AI infrastructure, as communities in Utah and El Paso push back on new data center campuses
LOS ANGELES (Sept., 2026) Investor Daniel Kaufman, founder of the permanent capital holding company Kaufman & Company, said Wednesday that America’s spending on computing now outpacing its spending on homes should change how AI campuses get built, with housing for the people who run them planned from the start instead of left to chance.
Fortune reported Sept. 20 that, according to federal data, U.S. spending on information processing equipment reached $752 billion in the second quarter, edging past real private residential fixed investment of $748 billion. Residential investment is down 18% from its early 2021 peak, while computing spending is up 51%.
The milestone lands as the backlash to data centers grows. In Utah, residents are challenging a county’s approval of a $10 billion data center campus, and El Paso adopted new rules for data centers this summer.
“For the first time, this country is putting more money into the machines that run AI than into the homes people live in,” Kaufman said. “I’m not here to fight that capital. We develop data centers ourselves. But every campus needs electricians, operators and their families living within a reasonable drive, and right now almost nobody is budgeting for those homes. That is how you lose a town hall, and it’s how you lose a workforce.”
Kaufman & Company has a stake on both sides of the trade. ServerDomes Global, a Kaufman Ventures portfolio company, announced plans in July for geodesic dome data centers in Utah and El Paso, Texas, including an El Paso site spanning 24,000 acres. The company has said the domes are designed to use about 90% less water than conventional facilities. On the housing side, the platform includes DK Homes, Design Build Affordable and the factory built Mr Good Container Homes, and works with Oldivai, an aligned, independently led workforce housing partner.
“Communities are right to ask what they get in return for hosting this infrastructure,” Kaufman said. “Our answer is that we don’t want a blighted site with a fence around it. We want to build housing and other uses around the domes, and we want the people who keep those buildings running to be able to live near them. An investor who treats the housing as somebody else’s problem is going to find the power, the permits and the people all harder to get.”
About Kaufman & Company
Kaufman & Company is a permanent capital holding company founded and led by Daniel Kaufman, spanning residential development, workforce housing, AI infrastructure and venture capital across 10 operating companies: Convivium Living, DanReDev, DEK Builds, Design Build Affordable, DK Homes, Forge Development Partners, Kaufman Development, Kaufman Real Estate & Consulting, LoneStar Kaufman and Kaufman Ventures. Backed by more than 25 years of real estate experience, the platform has delivered more than $2 billion in project value and financed or developed more than 10,000 housing units. Kaufman & Company is a d/b/a of Kaufman Family Office LLC and Kaufman Real Estate & Consulting LLC. Learn more at thekaufmanco.com.
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