As 2025 comes to an end, we’re digging back into our archives to revisit some of our favorite stories of the year. by Conor Kelley As 2025 comes to an end, we’re digging back into our archives to revisit some of our favorite sto ries of the year. See them all here. If you’ve seen old folks’ homes with a certain Cheesecake Factory aesthetic popping up around Washington, you know Aegis Living. A private pay assisted living chain that does not accept Medicare, Aegis owns $2.5 billion in property across Washington, California, and Nevada, including 23 “luxury” senior living centers in the Seattle area. Aegis’ CEO claims that the company brings in nearly $250 million in annual operating revenues from resident costs that can climb into the tens of thousands of dollars per month. Living at Aegis appears to be worth it, though: in March, their Greenwood facility was named the number one senior living facility in the country. With Medicaid cuts threatening to shut down many of our elder care facilities in the Pacific Northwest, there’s never been a better time to get to know our local retirement home landlord. To understand Aegis Living, you need to know about Dwayne J. Clark, the charismatic CEO driving the company’s vision. Clark has done a good job of building his mythology. In puff pieces like his most recent in Seattle Magazine, he talks about a childhood marked by hardship: His father left when he was five, and Clark’s mother raised him and his three siblings in Lewiston, ID, before relocating to Spokane, WA. He and his three siblings didn’t have much. In a story Clark recounts often, his family struggled so badly once that his mother, a line cook at the Elks Lodge in Lewiston, smuggled home a handful of potatoes from work and turned them into soup that sustained the family for a week. ...read more read less