Sam Zell was a brash and outspoken investor who made billions buying real estate ranging from office and apartment high-rises to mobile home parks — and earned the nickname “The Grave Dancer” for scooping up distressed assets.

Zell died Thursday at age 81, according to statements from two of the Chicago-based firms for which he served as chairman, Equity Residential and Equity Group Investments. Zell also is remembered for major deals such as the $39 billion sale of Equity Office Properties Trust to Blackstone in 2007. He helped popularize the real estate investment trust model in the 1990s.

Misses in his high-profile career included an $8.3 billion leveraged buyout of media giant Tribune Co., which led to a bankruptcy filing.

"The world has lost one of its greatest investors and entrepreneurs," Mark Parrell, Equity Residential's president and CEO, said in the statement announcing Zell’s death. "Sam’s insatiable intellectual curiosity and passion for deal making created some of the most dynamic companies in the public real estate industry. He was a generous philanthropist and an incredible mentor and friend and will be missed by all who were lucky enough to be part of his extraordinary world. We extend our deepest condolences to Sam’s family and loved ones."

Former Equity Residential CEO David Neithercut was named chairman of the Fortune 500 company, which owns almost 80,000 apartment units throughout the country. Neithercut, 67, was the REIT’s CEO from 2006 to 2018 and he has remained on the board of directors since 2006.

"Sam spent decades creating value for the investors in Equity Residential and his many other enterprises,” Neithercut said in the statement. “It was my great privilege to work closely and learn from him for more than 35 years and my honor to succeed him as chairman of Equity Residential. The board, executive leadership and all the employees of Equity Residential are committed to honoring Sam’s legacy through a continued focus on value creation for our shareholders."

Zell died at home from complications from a recent illness, according to a statement from Equity Group Investments.

“Sam lived life testing his limits and helping those around him do the same,” son-in-law Scott Peppet said in the Equity Group statement. He is married to Kellie Zell, one of Sam Zell’s three children.

“He was a self-made entrepreneur, an industry creator and leader, a brilliant dealmaker, a generous philanthropist, and the head of a family he fiercely loved and protected,” added Peppet, president of the Chai Trust Company, the Zells’ family office. “He had an unapologetic passion for life, a brilliant mind, a contagious wit, and a deep sense of civic responsibility and personal loyalty. All those who loved and learned from him will miss him terribly.”

Zell was born in Chicago in 1941 to Jewish parents who escaped the Nazi invasion of Poland.

He grew up in the Albany Park neighborhood on Chicago’s Northwest Side and later in the North Shore suburb of Highland Park, Illinois.

His business acumen was demonstrated early, with Zell founding the firm that became Equity Residential while he was a student at the University of Michigan. Zell, who briefly practiced law before deciding it was too boring, eventually took the company public in 1993.

His philanthropy had a strong focus on entrepreneurial education. College programs he established included the Zell Lurie Institute at his alma mater in Ann Arbor, Michigan, as well as the Fellows Program for entrepreneurship at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management just north of Chicago in Evanston, Illinois, and the Samuel & Robert Lurie Real Estate Center at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School in Philadelphia. He also created the Zell Entrepreneurship Program at Reichman University in Israel.

Robert Lurie was a college classmate and business partner of Zell until the wealthy Chicago businessman died of cancer in 1990.

Zell’s other companies included Equity Office, which he sold for a REIT-record price in 2007. Blackstone bought the 126 million-square-foot office portfolio just ahead of a market crash, helping cement Zell’s reputation for good timing.

“Sam Zell’s impact on commercial real estate transcended his deal making successes and driving force behind the institutionalization of commercial real estate,” Shlomo Chopp, a New York-based distressed real estate investor, said in an email to CoStar News. “As a visionary he saw value where others didn’t and challenges where others saw blue skies.”

Chopp recalled making a 45-minute Zoom pitch to Zell, describing it as “the thrill of a lifetime.”

“He was thoughtful and patiently listened,” Chopp said. “His response was definitive and very complimentary. I consider myself a student of his work and hope to one day emulate his successes.”

After emerging as one of the nation’s wealthiest real estate investors, Zell embraced his rebellious reputation, traveling the world by motorcycle with a group of friends known as “Zell’s Angels.” Zell, who married three times, also was known for publicly calling out politicians and economic policy makers, often in blunt, foul language.

In Chicago, he could be seen smoking on the balcony of his riverfront headquarters office at 2 N. Riverside Plaza.

One of Zell’s best-known mantras was, “When everyone is going left, look right.”

In doing so, Zell developed his “Grave Dancer” reputation for diving into distressed deals.

“Grave dancing is an art that has many potential benefits,” Zell once wrote in a Real Estate Review essay. “But one must be careful while prancing around not to fall into the open pit and join the cadaver. There is often a fine line between the dancer and the danced upon.”

One instance where Zell was unable to avoid the pit was his highly leveraged acquisition of Tribune Co., a sprawling entity that included ownership of the Chicago Cubs, newspapers such as the Chicago Tribune, Los Angeles Times and Newsday, and television and radio stations.

After the onset of a recession, the company filed for bankruptcy protection in 2008. That led to the company’s eventual sale of the baseball team and the creation of separate newspaper and broadcast companies.

Other investments outside of real estate fared better. He invested in companies in a wide range of industries over several decades, including sellers of cruises and bicycles.

“His passing is emotional for me because I invested a lot of personal time getting to know his complex character,” said longtime real estate journalist Ben Johnson.

He authored the 2009 book “Money Talks, Bullsh*t Walks: Inside the Contrarian Mind of Billionaire Mogul Sam Zell.”

“All I can say is that Sam Zell was a true icon and pioneer not only in the commercial real estate industry but also in global business,” Johnson said in an email to CoStar News. “He always had an uncanny knack for seeing things that others missed.”