Sacks @ 00:45:20Inconclusive
marketseconomy
Post-bankruptcy, a buyer of WeWork’s assets who aggressively sheds unprofitable locations and renegotiates remaining leases (including converting some to operator/revenue-share structures and cutting others to roughly 60% of prior rent levels) will be able, within a few years of emergence from bankruptcy, to operate WeWork as a profitable, cash-generating business.
So I think the landlord will take the bird in the hand. So think about it. Some private equity player goes in there renegotiates all these leases sheds the bad ones, and all of a sudden the business is going to make a lot of money.View on YouTube
Explanation
Key parts of Sacks’ setup have already happened, but his core claim about sustained profitability is on a longer timeline than the data we have.
What has happened so far
- WeWork filed for Chapter 11 in November 2023 and emerged from bankruptcy in mid‑June 2024 under a reorganization that wiped out about $4 billion of debt and shifted control to a lender group and Yardi Systems, which became majority owner.(reuters.com)
- During the bankruptcy, WeWork exited roughly a third of its locations and renegotiated hundreds of leases, cutting future rent obligations by around 40–50% (about $8–12 billion) and keeping a smaller, more profitable footprint.(cnbc.com)
- Post‑emergence, CEO John Santora says WeWork now uses three agreement types—traditional leases, revenue‑share deals, and pure management agreements—with about 130 locations on revenue‑share/management structures, which matches the prediction’s idea of shifting to operator/revenue‑share models to de‑risk leases.(time.com)
Profitability status as of late 2025
- In a 2025 TIME interview, Santora states that WeWork has never been profitable, but that its most recent quarter was break‑even on an EBITDA basis, the first time in its history.(time.com)
- A July 2025 Wall Street Journal piece reports that WeWork generated about $2.2 billion in revenue in 2024 and delivered its first quarterly EBITDA profits, with three recent quarters showing positive EBITDA. This indicates improvement but not yet clear, sustained net income or free‑cash‑flow profitability.(wsj.com)
Why this is “inconclusive”
- Sacks’ normalized prediction is that “within a few years of emergence from bankruptcy” a buyer who restructures leases will be able to run WeWork as a profitable, cash‑generating business. WeWork only emerged from Chapter 11 around June 2024, so “within a few years” points roughly to 2026–2027.
- As of November 2025, WeWork has restructured in exactly the way he described and is approaching EBITDA profitability, but it is not yet clearly a sustained, cash‑generating, net‑profit business, nor has the full time window he gave expired.
Because the key profitability outcome could still plausibly go either way within the remaining horizon, the prediction cannot yet be judged definitively right or wrong; it is too early, so “inconclusive.”