‘Security for Sale’ Grantees Discuss Reporting on Wall Street Landlords. As part of their Pulitzer Center-supported project Security for Sale, investigative journalists Tyler Dukes, Gordon Rago, and Payton Guion at The News & Observer and The Charlotte Observer investigated the growing industry of institutional investors and Wall Street hedge funds buying up single-family homes in North Carolina and transforming them into rent-backed profit generators. By using machine learning, the three journalists were able to gauge the scale of the growing number of absentee landlords in North Carolina’s real estate market. They found at least 40,000 single-family properties in the state are now held by about 20 companies. In a recent webinar, moderated by McClatchy Southeast Investigations Editor Cathy Clabby, the three reporters discussed how this investigation came to be, and what they learned along the way. Guion provided context for how this industry emerged in the wake of the 2008 f
With Piles of Cash, Big Investors Become NC’s Top Rental-Home Landlords. To view the interactive graphics in this report, click here. A powerful machine has cranked up in North Carolina. Quiet at first, it’s now hard to ignore. On the surface it looks simple. But.