Lil Baby’s latest venture into real estate is giving back to the community he came from.
A year after the 31-year-old rap star welcomed fans into his luxury bachelor pad in Atlanta during his Open Door episode with AD, he’s now giving a look at the home he used to live in—and recently bought back for himself.
In a YouTube vlog posted last week, the Grammy winner returns to the old address, accompanied by his two young sons, Jason and Loyal.
“Welcome to Oakland City Homes,” all three say at the top of the video before revealing a red-brick multi-family unit with fraying white awnings and black wrought iron.
As the camera pans to show the neighborhood’s sign and then back to the rapper, he adds, “I made history in this same exact spot and now I’m making history again.”
“I’m buying it for my son,” he continued. “See, they trying to take our neighborhood and I gotta put my foot down.”
He points out surrounding homes that have been scooped up by developers and are now being remodeled. The rapper then takes his sons on a tour of the property, using his phone as a flashlight and explaining to them—even as one shows a bit of apprehension about its current state—that once it’s fixed up, it will be back in its prime. While musing about what he plans to do with the home, he said he may rent it out but has no intention of ever selling it.
“I done did too much in, for, and around the hood,” he said, adding that younger generations are “ready to die for the hood” without actually owning property or businesses there.
“I ain’t just like, ‘Ah, it’s like a strategy to me buying a house.’ I’m buying all the houses, all the properties that I used to hustle in front of,” he said. “There were times when this was abandoned,” he continued, pointing to the property behind him, “and I still was standing here while it was abandoned. No light, no water, no nothing—just me and the smokers.”
“These be like my investments but they’re also more sentimental value pieces.”
Atlanta has routinely ranked among the fastest-gentrifying cities in the country, making the rapper’s move feel especially timely. Born Dominique Armani Jones, the artist was raised in Atlanta’s Oakland City neighborhood and has remained active in the community since rising to fame.
In addition to buying homes in the area to help shape its future, he has led back-to-school drives, launched The Jones Project to support underserved families, and created a $150,000 scholarship fund at his former high school.
During his latest back-to-school fundraiser in July, he told the Atlanta Voice, “It means a lot to be able to come back and give back.”
