After 40 years at the Rouse Company, Rouse retired from day-to-day management in 1979. Soon afterwards, he and his wife founded the Enterprise Community Partners, a not-for-profit foundation funded in part by a for-profit subsidiary, The Enterprise Development Company, and focused on seeding partnerships with community groups that would address the need for affordable housing and associated social services for poor neighborhoods. In 1984, Jim Rouse was soliciting business representing both Rouse Company as CEO and Enterprise Development as president. The Rouse Company board of directors asked Jim Rouse to leave as CEO of the Rouse Company and his position in Enterprise Development which ended his involvement with the company he founded.