The Richest Real Estate Billionaires On The 2021 Forbes 400 List

Donald Trump may have fallen off The Forbes 400 list of richest Americans this year, but his fellow real estate tycoons have boosted their wealth—both in hot markets (Palm Beach) and those still recovering (New York).

The group of real estate tycoons on this year’s Forbes 400 list of richest Americans is as notable for those who didn’t make the cut as for those who did: Donald Trump, with an estimated net worth of $2.5 billion, fell short of the $2.9 billion cut off to make it into the 400 richest Americans. The former president isn’t the only one to have fallen from the ranks in 2021. Five fellow New York real estate billionaires as well as Silicon Valley developers Richard Peery and John Arrillaga also dropped off The Forbes 400 list. Collectively, the 24 real estate tycoons on this year’s list are worth $122 billion, nearly $4 billion less than the 32 in real estate were worth in 2020.

Despite the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic and the delay in workers returning to offices in many cities across the country, America’s real estate barons have gotten wealthier as their prized assets and diversified portfolios recovered from 2020 lows. Outside of Washington, D.C.—where the sole real estate billionaire residing in the capital, Washington Nationals owner Ted Lerner, is $100 million poorer this year—real estate magnates based in cities ranging from New York and Chicago to Los Angeles and Palm Beach have seen their fortunes grow since the 2020 Forbes 400 list.

At the top, Orange County, California-based Donald Bren remains the wealthiest real estate billionaire in the country with an estimated $16.2 billion net worth, nearly $1 billion higher than last year. The biggest gainer is Chicago-based gambling and real estate mogul Neil Bluhm, whose net worth grew by $2.4 billion to $6.4 billion—but that was largely thanks to his shares in publicly traded online gaming outfit Rush Street Interactive. (His luxury retail real assets in Chicago have also done well despite the pandemic.) Click to read more at www.forbes.com.