By Freda Freeman
Correspondent
RALEIGH – Three childhood friends who grew up in Southeast Raleigh are pooling their business acumen, skills, experience, and money to preserve the history and legacy of their beloved communities.
Terrell Midgett, LeVelle Moton and Clarence Mann joined forces in 2020 to form Raleigh Raised Development, a real estate development and construction management company. Together they are building homes, renovating schools and supporting the community.
“We’re Raleigh raised, we grew up together, we have a passion for the city and what we do. When we got in the business, we saw the changing of the communities, and we wanted to make sure that we were able to provide housing and opportunities,” Midgett said.
Moton, North Carolina Central’s head men’s basketball coach, lived in the Cottages of Idlewild while growing up. He recalled how neighbors watched out for him, even feeding him when he was hungry.
“It’s super important to come back to a community that’s been so good to me,” Moton said. “I will never forget who I was and where I came from. Now that I’ve made it out, I’ve got to send the elevator back down.”
Midgett, Moton and Mann believe home ownership is key to controlling your destiny, and they want to help more Black people own their homes.
“The way that we help our community is by creating spaces and ownership for our community, because if you own the community and you own the spaces and you own the uses that go on in the community, then nobody can tell you any different what goes on in that community,” Mann said. “If you own that space, you determine what goes on in that community and you create something for your own people.”
Moton and Mann credit Midgett with being the impetus for Raleigh Raised. Midgett and Moton have been friends since about 9 years old. Mann, who’s 10 years younger, knew them through the Raleigh Boys Club. Later, Midgett, who worked in construction, and Mann, whose family was in real estate and land acquisition, started doing business together and worked on various projects from 2010 and 2020.
“Raleigh was really changing during that decade, and he said let the three of us get together and form the perfect company to impact the community, because all the redevelopment and development happening in Raleigh, the faces that were benefitting from the changes were not the faces that we were used to,” Mann said.
Mann said no one should benefit from Raleigh’s redevelopment more than the city’s lifelong Black residents. “The folks who have legacy should have priority on receiving all these changes, not people from out of town. The people who should benefit are the people who suffered in the 1950s, ‘60s, and ‘70s who slaved and went through Jim Crow and all this racism and segregation here in the city. They should be included in the positive change happening here in the city, not just folks from a different demographic, not people who 20, 30 years ago wouldn’t even have come to our neighborhood,” he said.
Raleigh Raised’s planned developments include Cottages of Idlewild and Holt at Oberlin, which they broke ground on in August and September, respectively. Working with Raleigh Housing Authority, the company is drafting a master plan to build a mixed-use development that will provide opportunities for over 1,000 families. They are also remodeling several schools, including Brentwood Elementary School and East Garner Middle School in Raleigh.
“The Cottages of Idlewild will be long-term affordable housing. We partnered with the Raleigh Land Trust to keep the housing at the current affordable rates for the next 99 years. The families that stayed in the area – such as the McDougalds, Motons, Jones, Pulleys, Blaylocks – will forever be a part of that community because all our projects are named after people in the community,” Midgett said.
Holt at Oberlin will bring eight market rate townhomes and one single-family home to Oberlin Road in late 2026. Oberlin was the largest Reconstruction-era Black settlement in Wake County. One way Raleigh Raised hopes to preserve the legacy of neighborhoods is by naming its redevelopment projects after Black families who have lived in those communities for decades. Holt at Oberlin is named after the Holt family who led the fight for the desegregation of Raleigh public schools.
“I was taught your blessing is when you give. So, the more you give, the more you get in return,” Mann said. “Especially coming from the community I come from, it’s important to give back to those communities, because, frankly, they’re in need. If we are blessed enough to be abundant enough to help folks, then we should do that. Your blessing comes from helping people.”
