This week's People of Note includes the following markets: Atlanta, Austin, Chicago, Cleveland/Northern Ohio, Los Angeles, New York City, Orange County, Philadelphia, South Bay and Washington, DC.
LOS ANGELES
JLL Taps Muhlstein as Managing Director
By Laurie Forbes
Industry veteran Carl Muhlstein joined the Los Angeles office of Jones Lang LaSalle as managing director. The former Cushman & Wakefield executive will focus on advising tenants, landlords and investors in the creative office and entertainment sectors.
Muhlstein has more than a quarter century of entertainment and creative office real estate experience.
Before JLL, he served as executive vice president in Cushman’s downtown location. Since 2007, Muhlstein has participated and advised in more than $2 billion of
commercial real estate deals.
JLL also hired Hayley Blockley as a senior vice president. Blockley is a former director of brokerage services from Cushman and partnered with Muhlstein in representing downtown clients. She has completed transactions valued at more than $250 million in the last five years.
Editor's Note: CoStar's People of Note is published each Friday covering the latest commercial real estate executive level promotions and new hires. Click on the headline of each article to jump to full coverage. Follow the news on Twitter [at] LaurieForbes and [at] TheCoStarGroup.
SOUTH BAY
UGL Services Taps Sugimoto To Head Silicon Valley Office
By CoStar Research
Douglas Sugimoto has joined UGL Services as a senior vice president and given responsibility for growing the firm's new Silicon Valley office.
Before transitioning to brokerage, Sugimoto held internal real estate positions with several local technology firms, including Intuit, Silicon Graphics, Covad & 3Com, specializing in lease restructuring/disposition and corporate advisory service.
More recently, Sugimoto was with Cornish & Carey Commercial Newmark Knight Frank and was recently involved in a number of high profile deals, including: Informatica's acquisition of a two-building, 290,000-square-foot headquarters facility in Pacific Shores; Avaya's expansion and sublease conversion to a direct 10-year lease in Santa Clara totaling 275,000 square feet; Riverbed's new 105,000-square-foot engineering center in Sunnyvale, CA; and Ariba's new 85,000-square-foot headquarters relocation in Sunnyvale.
WASHINGTON, DC
Cushman Hires Gil as Managing Director
By Laurie Forbes
Gideon Gil joined Cushman & Wakefield’s Equity, Debt and Structured Finance division as a managing director. The Washington, DC-based broker will advise clients with integrated capital solutions in all asset classes requiring debt and equity placement.
Gil formerly served as managing principal and co-founder of Columbia River Capital Advisors, a boutique commercial real estate investment firm. He also held positions at Clarion Partners, RCG Longview and Madison Realty Capital. His background includes originating, structuring and executing senior debt, mezzanine debt and both preferred and common equity investments on behalf of institutional investors.
AUSTIN
Toming Joins HFF Austin Office
By Rafael Ruiz
Rhonda Toming joined HFF in Austin as a managing director. Toming will manage primarily office and industrial investment sales for HFF in the central Texas.
She has nearly three decades of commercial real estate experience. Toming's experience includes all types of financial and investment sales brokerage. She previously at worked as an investment sales broker at Oxford Commercial and Fischer Financial.
PHILADELPHIA
Margolis Named Sr Managing Director of NGKF Capital Group
By Vickie Katlic
Newmark Grubb Knight Frank's Capital Group appointed Michael Margolis, CPA as a senior managing director in its Philadelphia office. Margolis has 30 years of experience in the institutional market with owners in the Philadelphia and surrounding areas. His client list included names like BPG Properties, Liberty Property Trust, Brandywine Realty Trust and many other top firms.
He previously worked at Grubb & Ellis and also served as president of investment sales with Professional Realty Advisors for the past four years. Before that Margolis held the office of director of acquisitions at Patriot Equities.
ORANGE COUNTY
HFF Hires Thomas
By Jim Naderer
Jeffrey Thomas will lead the net-lease investment team at HFF as senior managing director in Orange County. In this position, he will grow the net-lease investment sales platform nationally.
Thomas has more than 15 years of experience in commercial real estate. Prior to taking his new position, he worked as senior vice president at CBRE, focusing on net lease sales. He also worked as senior product manager at Loopnet.com.
ATLANTA
Hanrahan Joins Wood Partners as SVP of Asset Mgmt
By Finerve Holder
Wood Partners tapped 25-year industry veteran Robert Hanrahan as senior vice president of asset management to help oversee the firm's growing multifamily portfolio.
Based in the firm's Atlanta office, Hanrahan will develop business strategy for Wood’s portfolio, supervise and train asset managers, and take a lead role in communication with investors across the portfolio.
Prior to joining Wood Partners, he was the vice president of RREEF’s asset management team overseeing 17 multifamily and mixed-use properties valued at approximately $1 billion. He also managed portfolios for Colonial Properties, The Habitat Company, Tishman Midwest, and FiField Cos.
CLEVELAND/NORTHERN OHIO
Presti Promoted at Forest City
By Stuart Dryden
Forest City Enterprises, the Cleveland-based owner, developer and manager of real estate, promoted Geralyn Presti to executive vice president, general counsel and secretary. Since 2002, Presti has been the general counsel for the company.
A recipient of numerous awards, she has been elected to the Society of Benchers by the board of the CWRU Law School as well as selected as a 2007 Rainmaker by the Northern Ohio Live magazine.
Presti received her bachelor's degree from The Ohio University and a joint Master of Social Science Administration and Juris Doctor from Case Western University.
WASHINGTON, DC
LCOR Appoints Thompson as SVP
By Richard Collins
Harmar Thompson joined LCOR as the senior vice president of development. He will be based in the real estate investment, development and management firm's Bethesda, MD, office.
Thompson will pursue new opportunities in both multifamily and commercial areas. He has more than 15 years of experience in the commercial real estate industry directing acquisitions, development and asset management activities across the East Coast. Thompson was previously at Lowe Enterprise Real Estate Group, where he was responsible for directing the strategy and implementation of the East Coast portfolio.
CHICAGO
Podolsky Northstar Names 3 New Principals
By Claire Jun
Podolsky Northstar CORFAC International named three new principals to the firm: (pictured from left to right) Steven Tick, SIOR, Melissa Podolsky, RPA and Adam Tarantur.
Tick has more than 25 years of experience in the brokerage and redevelopment industry. He joined Podolsky Northstar in 1995, and previously served as senior vice president in the brokerage division. Tick is also a member of Society of Industrial and Office Realtors and the Association of Industrial Real Estate Brokers.
Melissa Podolsky joined the team at Podolsky Northstar in 2004. She served as senior vice president of the property management team. Podolsky is also a licensed Illinois real estate broker, assisting with tenant representation brokerage assignments and tenant renewals.
Tarantur joined the firm in 2005 after graduating from the University of Wisconsin - Madison School of Business in Real Estate & Urban Land Economics. During his six years at the firm, he has become a senior vice president of the company's brokerage division and member of the company's board.
ATLANTA
Studley Promotes 3 in Strategic Portfolio Solutions Group
By Finerve Holder
Studley promoted (pictured from left to right) Kelly Evans, Ryan Rawls and Sheena Stone in its strategic portfolio solutions group in Atlanta.
Evans, a certified project management professional, was named managing director. Previously a director, Evans leads and manages a 5 million square-foot portfolio on the company’s SPS Business Intelligence Portal, which shows a graphical view of client portfolios.
Rawls, a CPA, was promoted from assistant director to director. With a finance background, Rawls provides financial analysis, transaction management and strategic consulting to his clients.
Stone was promoted from manager of business development to director of business development. Stone manages the marketing as well as secures some of the accounts for the SPS group. An active CoreNet Global member, she has experience in corporate real estate proposal, presentation and message development.
CLEVELAND/NORTHERN OHIO
Bertovich Joins Premier Development Partners
By Holly E. Polivka
Pamela Bertovich joined Premier Development Partners as senior partner. She will focus on investment sales, triple-net investments, including 1031 exchange transactions in the Cleveland and Akron markets.
Bertovich has more than 17 years of experience in commercial brokerage. She previously worked for Cresco Real Estate as vice president of office and industrial brokerage.
Premier specializes in commercial real estate development, interior and exterior construction, site and building infrastructure and asset value creation.
NEW YORK CITY
Pilchick Joins Eastern Union CRE
By Timothy Weber
Avi Pilchick has joined Eastern Union Commercial Real Estate, one of America’s highest-transacting, privately-owned mortgage companies, as its chief operating officer in New York City.
Pilchick’s role at Eastern Union will be to strengthen corporate influences, policies, and procedures; and to make sure that brokers have the information, tools, and staff needed to complete their jobs.
Pilchick was previously a senior executive with a Pennsylvania-based real estate vendor, building out and running the customer service division. Under Pilchick the company expanded and was ultimately sold to a venture capital firm.
Follow the news on Twitter [at] LaurieForbes and [at] TheCoStarGroup. Check out last week's edition of People of Note.