For the first time, U.S. spending on information processing equipment has eclipsed spending on private residential investment, according to federal data reported by Fortune on Sept. 20. Computing spending reached $752 billion in the second quarter, edging past the $748 billion spent on real private residential fixed investment. Residential investment has fallen 18% from its early 2021 peak, while computing spending has surged 51%.
The milestone arrives amid growing pushback against data centers. 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. Against that backdrop, investor Daniel Kaufman, founder of the permanent capital holding company Kaufman & Company, said Wednesday that the shift should change how AI campuses are built.
“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.”
The implications extend beyond one company’s strategy. As AI infrastructure spending continues to outpace housing investment, the data center industry faces a dual challenge: securing enough power and winning local approval. Kaufman’s argument suggests that integrating workforce housing into site plans could be a way to address both. By providing homes for electricians, operators and their families, developers may reduce community opposition and ensure a reliable labor pool. The approach also signals a potential shift in how AI campuses are valued—not just as computing hubs but as mixed-use developments that contribute to local housing supply. If adopted more broadly, it could reshape the economics and politics of data center construction at a time when the sector’s rapid growth is increasingly colliding with local concerns over land, water and infrastructure. Kaufman & Company, backed by more than 25 years of real estate experience, has delivered more than $2 billion in project value and financed or developed more than 10,000 housing units across its 10 operating companies.
