(Save the date: RealShare Apartments comes to the Westin Bonaventure, Los Angeles, October 24.)

BETHESDA, MD-In a deal that tips the scales at $234 million, locally based Walker & Dunlop has closed on its purchase of CWCapital. CWC was wholly owned by funds managed by affiliates of Fortress Investment Group. The price of the deal, which GlobeSt.com reported on in June, is comprised of $80 million in cash and the issuance of 11.6 million shares of common stock to an affiliate of Fortress worth $154 million, based on Walker’s August 31 closing share price. An affiliate of Fortress is now Walker & Dunlop’s largest shareholder and will take two seats on the board.

In a statement, spokespeople for Walker put 2011 originations for both firms at $7.7 billion. That would have placed the combined firms in the Number-Two slot among multifamily lenders and Number 8 among US commercial lenders in the Mortgage Bankers Association’s production rankings for that year.

“In 2007, we embarked on an ambitious five-year growth plan that has included two major acquisitions and the company’s IPO,” states chairman, president and CEO Willy Walker. "Our success has driven us from the 45th largest commercial real estate lender in 2007 to the eighth largest following this most recent acquisition. We are also now the largest Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and HUD/FHA lender, on a combined basis, in the country.”