NEW YORK CITY-In continuing to expand its New York City footprint, brokerage firm Lee & Associates has hired Kenneth Salzman as senior managing director & principal, GlobeSt.com has learned. The 16-year veteran of the commercial real estate industry will focus on tenant representation and corporate real estate advisory at the firm’s new Manhattan office.
“It’s a group of extraordinarily motivated and cool people,” Salzman tells GlobeSt.com. “It is a terrific opportunity both from building a tenant rep business that is really client focused and interested in achieving client’s goals, as well as a terrific environment for brokers to work in.”
Salzman, who previously worked at Newmark Knight Frank for more than 15 years, represented a diverse roster of multinational corporations with their global real estate requirements. His specialization, which includes the evaluation of space usage and the creation of logistics analysis, will help the firm provide alternative strategies for media, technology and other professional services tenants.
In his new role, Salzman will take his international expertise to the local New York market. “I have a passion for working with companies that have to understand and translate their business needs to landlord’s expectations,” Salzman says, noting that good opportunities for tenants exist in Lower Manhattan. “I’m seeing a lot of activity Downtown right now. I think there are some terrific values and landlords who are looking to lease up their properties.”
Joel Herskowitz, COO at Lee NYC, tells GlobeSt.com that his relationship with Salzman goes back to the early 1990s, where the two worked together at Newmark & Co.
“Back in those days, part of my responsibilities was putting together and planning programs for the younger brokers, the juniors at Newmark,” he says. “It’s easy to remember. Ken was the first one in all of our training programs, and he just absorbed every bit of valuable information that was passed along by any of the speakers. He took what he learned and he took it very seriously. Ken became a very, very fine tenant rep producer.”
He adds, “it was natural of us to reach out to Ken and we were very lucky that at the end of the day, we were able to bring him to our firm.”
Salzman’s hire comes shortly after ex-Grubb & Ellis brokers Howard Rosen and John Cannon joined Lee NYC in January. The firm is also planning more additions in March.
As the company continues its New Yorke expansion, James Wacht, president and CEO at Lee NYC, tells GlobeSt.com that the firm takes a different approach than the bigger corporations.
“The one thing we are looking for in everyone we hire here, and Ken certainly fits that mold, we are trying to create a culture of collaboration,” Wacht says. “I think at a lot of brokerage firms, that doesn’t necessarily happen. You have people that tend to work very independently and we say they work in ‘silos,’ but we don’t quite want that. We are making sure the people we hire understand that as a company culture, that is a value we really emphasize.”
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