Don Baker is a full-time staff reporter for RealtyWire, where he covers residential real estate, commercial real estate, multifamily housing, market trends, finance, construction, rental data, and regulatory issues affecting the real estate industry.
Before joining RealtyWire, Don worked as an investor relations director for a multifamily private equity fund, where he wrote investor updates and reporting materials on the performance, operations, and outlook of investment properties. That role gave him hands-on experience analyzing real estate trends, rental statistics, construction activity, financing issues, multifamily operations, compliance matters, and the legal and regulatory factors that shape property ownership and investment.
Don brings a broad understanding of both residential and commercial real estate to his reporting, with a particular focus on helping readers understand how market data, policy changes, capital markets, and local property trends affect buyers, sellers, investors, brokers, developers, and property owners.
He earned a Bachelor of Science in Business from Southern Illinois University and currently lives in Atlanta, Georgia.
Don Baker 
The Justice Department and Rocket Mortgage have jointly asked a federal court in Colorado to pause a closely watched appraisal-discrimination lawsuit while the two sides pursue a settlement, according to court filings entered July 31 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado. In two joint motions — one requesting a settlement conference … Read more
Bank of America has paid $155 million to buy five buildings and two parking garages it previously leased at its Southside Boulevard operations campus in Jacksonville, Florida, according to Jacksonville business press reporting Aug. 10. The sale closed Aug. 6. The purchase covers roughly 820,000 square feet across Buildings 200, 300, 400, 500 and 600 … Read more
The five highest-priced home sales publicly reported in the New York, New York metro area for the week ending August 9, 2026, combined for $100.70 million, led by a $42,000,000 apartment sale on Lafayette Street.
The five highest-priced home sales reported in the Miami, Florida metro area for the week ending August 9, 2026, were led by a $22,750,000 closing on Di Lido Island in Miami Beach.
The five highest-priced home sales reported in the Boston metro area for the week ending August 9, 2026, were led by the $12.5 million sale of a Beacon Street penthouse in Boston.
The five highest-priced home sales publicly reported in the Charlotte metro area for the week ending August 9, 2026, were led by a $5,725,000 closing in Mooresville.
The Las Vegas metro area’s five highest-priced home sales for the week ending August 9, 2026, combined for $29.06 million, led by a $13.3 million estate in Henderson’s MacDonald Highlands.
Vornado, Rudin Management and an entity tied to Citadel’s Ken Griffin will jointly redevelop 350 Park Avenue into a 1.9M-square-foot trophy tower, with Citadel signing a 15-year anchor lease as part of the $6.2 billion project.
U.S. home sales fell to their lowest level in nearly two years in July, with San Antonio, Dallas and Seattle posting the steepest declines even as West Palm Beach and San Francisco saw sales grow, Redfin found.
The five highest-priced home sales publicly reported in the Chicago metro area for the week ending August 9, 2026, led by a $7,870,528 full-floor residence at One Chicago.
The Washington Commanders have selected a joint venture of Clark Construction, Mortenson and Smoot Construction to build their new $3.8 billion stadium at the former RFK Stadium site, with completion targeted for spring 2030.
Dallas Tanner, CEO of the nation’s largest single-family rental landlord, told CNBC he expects the new federal ban on large-scale institutional homebuying to ease prices over time, but not immediately.
A new Consumer Federation of America and Weiss Ratings analysis, highlighted by Realtor.com, finds home insurers collectively earn $8.8 million a day in extra investment income for every day a claim payment is delayed — a $61.6 million windfall over a week.
Douglas Elliman’s second-quarter net loss narrowed to $2.7 million as the luxury brokerage launched an AI transformation, including a new intelligence platform called Elius built with Google Cloud.
Meta is committing $1 billion to a new fund supporting teachers, first responders and infrastructure in the U.S. communities that host its data centers, CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced Monday.
Shores, a 544-unit waterfront apartment community in Marina del Rey, California, has sold for $170 million to affiliates of Jackson Square Properties, one of the largest multifamily transactions in Los Angeles County this year.
Wage growth for residential building workers slowed to 1.0% in June, with inflation-adjusted pay down 2.4% year over year, as softer construction activity weighs on labor demand, NAHB finds.
JBG SMITH reported a $59.2 million second-quarter net loss and disclosed it has not booked a liability for a $356.1 million court judgment tied to the Wardman Tower condominium case, which it plans to appeal.
Peabody, Mass., a Boston-area suburb, ranked No. 1 on Realtor.com’s 2026 Hottest ZIP Codes report, with listings drawing four times the national average traffic and selling in just 20 days.
The typical U.S. home seller realized a 44.1% return in the first quarter of 2026, down from 47.2% in the fourth quarter of 2025 and 50.2% a year earlier, according to ATTOM. The national median sale price held at $360,000, unchanged from the prior quarter. Sellers are still making substantial money. They are simply making … Read more
A Bel Air estate at 11005 Bellagio Place has listed for $88 million, according to The Real Deal. The property spans more than 18,000 square feet on 1.7 acres. Luxford Group purchased the vacant site for $14.5 million in 2015 and completed the house in 2023. The home previously hosted a Louis Vuitton exhibit, per … Read more
Centric Development and Sage Equities sold a 611-unit, five-property Class A senior housing portfolio in the Atlanta suburbs for $147 million in an all-cash deal arranged by JLL.
Apollo Global Management is investing $1.02 billion in a joint venture with Starwood Real Estate Income Trust covering roughly 120 affordable housing properties, easing SREIT’s liquidity pressure.
Five of the highest-priced publicly reported home sales in the Denver, Colorado metro area for the week ending Sunday, August 2, 2026 — $25.30 million combined, an average of $5.06 million, led by a 19,553-square-foot Cherry Hills Village estate.
National apartment rents rose for a fifth straight month in July, with Sun Belt markets that were hit hardest by new supply showing early signs of recovery, according to Yardi Matrix’s latest national multifamily report.
Dream Finders Homes has agreed to acquire Beazer Homes in an all-cash deal worth about $2.2 billion, the companies announced Aug. 6, ending a monthslong pursuit that started as a hostile bid and closes as a unanimously approved merger creating the nation’s sixth-largest listed homebuilder. Under the agreement, Beazer shareholders will receive $33.50 in cash … Read more
Starwood Property Trust’s GAAP net income fell 95% in the second quarter, dropping to $6.6 million from $129.8 million a year earlier, even as the commercial mortgage REIT’s preferred profitability measure held essentially flat, the company reported for the quarter ended June 30. GAAP earnings per diluted share came in at 1 cent, down from … Read more
American Healthcare REIT raised its full-year guidance after posting its tenth consecutive quarter of double-digit same-store net operating income growth, the healthcare and senior housing REIT disclosed Aug. 6 in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Total portfolio same-store NOI grew 13.2% in the second quarter compared with a year earlier, extending a … Read more
Proptech startups raised a reported $650.4 million across 30 financing events in June, according to CRETI. The analysis emphasizes investor preference for specialized software and operational use cases over broad, all-purpose platforms. Funding totals depend on CRETI’s inclusion criteria and disclosed deal values; large individual rounds should be verified against company or investor announcements. Key … Read more
NAHB’s Multifamily Production and Occupancy Indexes both declined in Q2 2026, with mid- and high-rise sentiment falling the most amid financing costs, permitting delays and labor shortages.
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