Spotlight: Walton Global and Its Land Banking DST Program

The Scottsdale firm has distributed more than $3 billion to investors since 1979, and the most recent billion of that took five years.

September 3, 2026

Walton Global is a Scottsdale, Arizona land asset manager that acquires pre-development land in North American growth corridors, holds it, and sells it to homebuilders. According to the firm, it manages about $4.44 billion in real estate assets for investors in more than 91 countries, with more than 85,000 acres under ownership or management, roughly 90 percent of it in the United States, spread across 35 markets and more than 170 master-planned communities.

In May 2026 Walton reported passing $3 billion in cumulative distributions to investors, and broke out the pace: the first billion took 33 years, from 1979 through 2012, the second took nine years through 2021, and the third took five. Jordan McKenzie, the firm’s CFO, attributed the change to institutional interest in land for an undersupplied housing market and to homebuilders moving toward land banking and land financing rather than carrying land on their own balance sheets.

Walton was founded in Calgary in 1979 by the Doherty family under the name Quance Enterprises, and Bill Doherty is the current CEO. Its first pre-development syndication was a 14-acre Alberta parcel sold to individual investors in 1986. Asia operations opened in Hong Kong in 1992, US operations followed in 2007, and the global headquarters moved to Scottsdale in 2020. In 2018 the firm consolidated 132 Canadian entities into a single roll-up corporation carrying more than $500 million in net asset value.

Builder Land Financing sets the lot price before the purchase

Under the Builder Land Financing structure, launched in 2020, Walton acquires land that a builder or developer has identified and signs an option agreement at the same time for the future purchase of lots in phases. The lot price and the phased take-down schedule are agreed before Walton buys the asset, and investors receive cash flow annually as the builder exercises each option. Positions are all-equity across a multi-property portfolio. The firm added a Finished Lot Program under the structure in 2024, expanded it in 2025 through a co-investment commitment from GoldenTree Asset Management, and reported its 30th acquisition under the structure that year. Walton says it has worked with most of the country’s twenty largest homebuilders.

A DST that targets appreciation rather than income

Walton launched its DST program in March 2023, structured differently from most 1031 replacement property. The trusts hold land, carry no debt, and are not designed to distribute current income; the return depends on the eventual sale. Walton buys the parcel in an all-cash transaction, a builder signs a purchase and sale agreement after a required hold period, the builder runs the entitlement process, and the land is sold at paper lot value, with the value the builder adds during entitlement passed through to investors at sale. Anticipated holds run three years or more. South Carolina Growth 1 – Martintown Road, about 130 acres in North Augusta along an Augusta, Georgia growth corridor, closed fully subscribed in July 2026 after raising approximately $3.15 million, with an anticipated three-to-four-year hold.

In February 2026 Walton launched the American Builder Growth and Income Fund, which pairs secured land loans originated through Builder Land Financing with the growth-oriented acquisition strategy. The fund seeks up to $500 million through independent broker-dealers, registered investment advisers and family office asset managers, and Katie Hubbard, president of US capital markets, has described land as offering inflation protection and low correlation to financial markets alongside income and growth.

Walton raises capital through both institutional and retail channels, with offices in Calgary, Hong Kong, Singapore, Taipei, Manila and Dubai. Its investor login page routes to separate portals for Asia and the Middle East, Canada and Germany, alongside portals run by Vistra and by Great Lakes Fund Solutions.

Recent exits

Walton closed a 1,736-acre bulk land sale in the Austin MSA in June 2026 for a large-scale master-planned community, a 33.17-acre commercial sale at Westphalia Town Center in Prince George’s County, Maryland in July, and a phase one sale of 79 acres at Southport Village in Spartanburg County, South Carolina in August. The firm recorded its 300th property exit in 2024, and Sprouts Farmers Market was named grocery anchor at Westphalia Town Center in May 2026.