Zachary Kussin
Zachary Kussin distinguishes himself through award-winning coverage that bridges high-stakes luxury transactions with accessible housing insights, consistently connecting market dynamics to human narratives in the New York real estate landscape. As real estate editor at the New York Post with a decade of tenure, he leverages deep industry relationships to secure exclusive access to major transactions while maintaining focus on practical implications for everyday residents.
Luxury Market Authority
Kussin regularly reports on ultra-high-end transactions including multi-million dollar Manhattan townhouse sales like the $70 million listing at 8 E. 62nd St. and celebrity-linked properties such as Steve Mnuchin's family $35 million listing. His coverage extends beyond price tags to examine market fluctuations, noting when properties re-enter the market at reduced prices after initial ambitious valuations. He maintains consistent access to REBNY (Real Estate Board of New York) events where industry leaders discuss billion-dollar pipelines.
Housing Accessibility Focus
His reporting consistently addresses affordability challenges, analyzing competitive markets like Newark described as "the nation's most competitive housing" market. Kussin demonstrates particular expertise in translating complex insurance requirements for renters and homeowners, detailing that renter's policies covering $12,000 in contents typically cost about $20 monthly while homeowner's policies can reach $110 monthly. This practical guidance distinguishes his work from reporters focusing solely on luxury segments.
Industry Innovation Coverage
Kussin identifies emerging real estate trends before they reach mainstream awareness, as demonstrated by his January 2019 report on "the first space hotel" featuring "plush guest suites with padded beds" and high-speed connectivity. During the pandemic, he documented how Netflix's virtual viewing parties impacted housing behaviors, showing his ability to connect technology shifts with real estate implications.
His 2018 New York State Associated Press Association award recognized this forward-looking approach to real estate journalism.
Personal Narrative Integration
Unlike many beat reporters, Kussin incorporates personal experience to illuminate broader housing issues, notably in his March 2019 first-person account "How I survived losing my home in a devastating fire". This approach creates authentic connections between market data and human consequences, giving his reporting distinctive emotional resonance while maintaining journalistic rigor. His decade-long perspective at the New York Post provides historical context that newer reporters lack.
4 more real estate journalists.
Aaron Elstein
Aaron Elstein brings a Wall Street reporter’s eye to commercial real estate. He is a senior reporter at Crain’s New York Business, where he covers large office towers, Midtown corridors, landlords, lenders, investors and regulators. His reporting shows how ownership decisions, bank balance sheets, capital markets and regulation shape property values and risk. He also covers banking, finance and Wall Street, including bank mergers and investment firms. Before joining Crain’s in 2003, he wrote Heard on the Street columns for The Wall Street Journal and covered bank mergers for American Banker. Elstein reports by closely reading footnotes, contracts, regulatory filings and legal documents. His investigative work has examined executive payments, pension funds, tax enforcement and tenant harassment. His coverage places deals, disputes and enforcement actions within broader financial and property cycles.
Aaron Moselle
Aaron Moselle covers housing and community development for WHYY’s PlanPhilly, filing for radio and the web. He stands out for connecting market data and government action to displacement, affordable homes, and the daily questions facing renters and homeowners. His core beat is housing affordability and market strain, including high mortgage rates, rising prices, tax assessments, and what they mean for buyers, sellers, and renters. He also reports on preserving and creating affordable housing, neighborhood rehab efforts, major real estate deals, and the effect of property sales on residents. His work often uses direct sourcing, plain language, and service journalism to make policy and finance clear.
Aarthi Swaminathan
Aarthi Swaminathan is a personal finance reporter at MarketWatch whose distinctive beat connects residential real estate with household budgets. She covers housing prices, affordability, mortgage rates, financing, insurance, remodeling and the costs of owning a home. Her reporting examines overvalued and fast-rising markets, ZIP-code trends, second-home sellers, builders, developers and buyers facing higher borrowing costs. She also follows Gen Z buyers, owners trapped in weakening condo markets and neighborhood conflicts over development. Her work pairs data-driven housing analysis with detailed case studies of buyers, owners and sellers. She explains complex market data in clear, accessible language and writes news features, personal-finance explainers, Economic Report stories, The Big Move and New American Playbook. She won a silver award for Best Collection of Work by an Individual Covering Residential Real Estate.
Abbey Ferguson
Abbey Ferguson stands out for reporting how major commercial moves and redevelopment plans reshape the built environment, especially the real estate deals that reveal what land and retail space are worth. She covers Central Texas commercial real estate and development for KWTX, with recent stories on land valuation, major transactions, retail redevelopment, and infrastructure planning. Her work has tracked an $80 million data center site offer in Hill County, a prospective Trader Joe’s location in Waco, and a planning project using artificial intelligence to predict traffic patterns. She writes as a news reporter, staying close to the numbers, public records, brokers, officials, and landowners. Her stories turn contract prices, appraisal data, and listing history into plain explanations of what buyers are betting on and how those deals affect surrounding property owners and nearby businesses.