Kathy Britton

Britton got her start as a model-home greeter. In 2025, she made the Forbes list of the world’s wealthiest people.

Not that it was a straight line or unfettered path for Britton. She took over Houston-based residential builder Perry Homes in 2013, assuming leadership after the death of her father, Bob Perry, who founded the company in 1967. She brought a law degree and experience in Perry Homes’ sales and land acquisition departments to the job, and wasted little time putting her own mark on the company.

Britton’s varied experience came into play as she pursued expansion opportunities in the Texas Triangle, getting beyond the Houston metro to enter the Austin and Dallas-Fort Worth markets. Her decision to hand day-to-day oversight by naming Todd Chachere as CEO in 2022 opened her up to focus on big-picture strategy, like the firm’s move to buy into Florida in 2024, with the acquisition of Jacksonville, Florida-based homebuilder MasterCraft Builder Group.

Perry Homes now counts more than 65,000 homes built across 120 or so residential developments in its portfolio, and notched $2.4 billion in revenue in 2024, the most recent total available. The firm is consistently among the top five homebuilders in Houston, and billed as the largest woman-owned homebuilder in the nation. The privately held outfit doesn’t disclose profits, but Forbes put Britton’s personal fortune at $2.6 billion.