NEW BRUNSWICK—“The money is betting on New Jersey,” says Alexander Cohen, CEO of Liberty SBF, a CRE financing firm, and one of the panelists featured at next week's RealShare New Jersey Conference. In comments provided exclusively to GlobeSt.com in advance of his appearance at the conference, Cohen says “The fundamental bedrock infrastructure of a CRE expansion and recovery are evident,” while warning that the lack of job creation in the middle class is a major drag holding back full recovery, including growth in occupancy and rents.

Unfunded state pension liabilities and high state taxes are also responsible for slower growth, Cohen says. “The result is tepid expansion plans for corporations and a significant exodus of the middle class approaching retirement age,” he says.

Cohen, CEO of Liberty SBF, a leading commercial real estate finance company, will join John Adderly, executive vice president - managing director, NAI Mertz; Jose Cruz, senior managing director, HFF; Nat Gambuzza; vice president of investments, Marcus & Millichap; and David Simon, executive managing director, Massey Knakal Realty Services, on a panel entitled, “Transactions: Getting the Deals Done,” moderated by Mitchell S. Berkey, Esq., co-chair, Real Estate Development and Land Use Group, Wolff & Samson PC ,scheduled to start at 10:45 a.m. The conference kicks off Thursday, September 11 at 7:45am at the Hyatt Regency in New Brunswick.