Billionaire co-founder of WeWork, Adam Neumann, is reinventing himself as a real estate kingpin, purchasing thousands of apartments across the United States, mostly in the southern cities like Atlanta and Miami.
Since being pressured by Investors to resign from WeWork in 2019, Neumann has invested in dozens of startups and laid roots for a venture of his own. The billionaire and entities tied to him have purchased stakes in more than 4,000 apartments valued at over $1 billion.
While at WeWork, the billionaire explored an interest in residential spaces with a business called WeLive. The company opened a small number of communal apartments, sort of like college dorms for adults. It wasn’t very successful and was shut down as the IPO went sideways and the company lost a lot of money and nearly ran out of cash.
The prospectus of the IPO showed losses and conflict of interest including real estate transactions between Neumann and the company that caused a problem amongst the investors.
Despite being pressured to resign, the billionaire still owns a sizable stake of WeWork and has a net worth of $2.2 billion.