America’s downtowns are struggling, with empty office buildings and shuttered retail weighing down property values in cities across the country. But not everyone is hurting. In fact, the nation’s richest landlords are actually wealthier now than they were in 2022. There are 25 billionaires on the 2023 Forbes 400 list who primarily owe their fortunes to real estate. These property tycoons are worth a collective $139 billion—about $5 billion more than the 24 in real estate were worth on the 2022 ranking.
Despite the doom and gloom in the office sector, apartments are still a hot commodity, with rents rising nearly 3% over the past year. One of the two newcomers to the list who made their money in real estate, Los Angeles-based developer Geoffrey Palmer, largely draws his wealth from residential properties in L.A. The other new entry, Annette Lerner, inherited her late husband Ted Lerner’s (d. February 2023) fortune, mostly made up of apartments in the Washington, D.C. area.
Still, it’s been a rough time for some of America’s real estate tycoons. The best-known of them, Donald Trump, dropped off The Forbes 400 for the second time in three years. Eight others’ net worths fell by a collective $4.6 billion. Many of these big losers, like Trump, have a sizable portion of their wealth tied up in debt-laden office buildings in hard-hit cities such as New York and San Francisco. Fellow New Yorkers Charles Cohen and Jerry Speyer, both of whom have several office towers in Manhattan, saw their fortunes fall by $700 million and $500 million, respectively. The second-richest real estate baron in America—Stephen Ross, founder of the Related Companies, which built the Hudson Yards development in New York—was the biggest real estate loser over the past year. His fortune shrank by an estimated $1.5 billion.
Despite the doom and gloom in the office sector, apartments are still a hot commodity, with rents rising nearly 3% over the past year. One of the two newcomers to the list who made their money in real estate, Los Angeles-based developer Geoffrey Palmer, largely draws his wealth from residential properties in L.A. The other new entry, Annette Lerner, inherited her late husband Ted Lerner’s (d. February 2023) fortune, mostly made up of apartments in the Washington, D.C. area.
Still, it’s been a rough time for some of America’s real estate tycoons. The best-known of them, Donald Trump, dropped off The Forbes 400 for the second time in three years. Eight others’ net worths fell by a collective $4.6 billion. Many of these big losers, like Trump, have a sizable portion of their wealth tied up in debt-laden office buildings in hard-hit cities such as New York and San Francisco. Fellow New Yorkers Charles Cohen and Jerry Speyer, both of whom have several office towers in Manhattan, saw their fortunes fall by $700 million and $500 million, respectively. The second-richest real estate baron in America—Stephen Ross, founder of the Related Companies, which built the Hudson Yards development in New York—was the biggest real estate loser over the past year. His fortune shrank by an estimated $1.5 billion.
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00:00 The nation's richest landlords are actually wealthier now than they were in 2022.
00:05 There are 25 billionaires on the 2023 Forbes for 100 list who primarily owe their fortunes to real estate.
00:11 These property tycoons are worth a collective $139 billion,
00:17 about $5 billion more than the 24 in real estate were worth on the 2022 ranking.
00:23 Here are the five richest real estate billionaires on this year's Forbes for 100.
00:27 Number five, Jeff Green.
00:30 Green made a fortune buying credit default swaps on subprime mortgage-backed bonds
00:34 during the housing crisis in 2007 and 2008.
00:38 He then turned that profit into a portfolio of apartments, condo buildings, hotels, and office properties,
00:44 mostly in California, Florida, and New York.
00:46 Growth in those assets helped add another estimated $300 million to Green's net worth over the past year.
00:53 Number four, Igor Alenikoff.
00:55 Alenikoff owns more than 8 million square feet of office space and over 17,000 residential units
01:01 in states including Arizona, California, and Florida.
01:05 This year, he spent $165 million to buy two apartment complexes in Duluth, Georgia, and Raleigh, North Carolina,
01:12 further expanding his residential real estate holdings.
01:15 Number three, Leonard Stern.
01:19 Stern is best known as the namesake of New York University's business school,
01:23 thanks to a $30 million gift in 1988.
01:26 But the prolific donor draws his wealth from Hartz Mountain,
01:29 a firm that owns more than 260 properties, largely industrial, plus offices, hotels, and apartments.
01:36 Strong demand for industrial real estate and apartments
01:39 helped Stern grow his fortune by an estimated $500 million over the past year.
01:44 Number two, Stephen Ross.
01:47 Ross's Related Companies, which he founded in 1972,
01:51 is best known for the Hudson Yards development in New York.
01:54 It owns and manages more than $60 billion in assets,
01:57 stretching across the U.S., plus a joint venture in London.
02:01 The firm has also been expanding into South Florida
02:04 and is now the largest owner of commercial real estate in West Palm Beach.
02:08 Ross was also the biggest real estate loser of the past year.
02:10 His fortune shrunk by an estimated $1.5 billion.
02:15 And at number one, Donald Brenn.
02:17 Through his Irvine company, Brenn controls a real estate empire
02:21 totaling more than 129 million square feet of office buildings,
02:25 apartments, and shopping malls across California,
02:28 as well as a 97.5% stake in the MetLife building in Manhattan,
02:32 three office towers in Chicago, and two golf courses.
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