CBRE has named industry veteran Michael Taxin to oversee its New York retail business as the sector has shown solid signs of recovery from the damages of the pandemic.
As a senior managing director, Taxin is responsible for managing CBRE’s retail business in the city, the world's largest real estate services firm said in a statement.
Taxin was most recently a senior managing director at Cushman & Wakefield and oversaw Cushman's retail and office brokerage operations in New York as well as leading its business in suburban Westchester County, New York, and Stamford, Connecticut, CBRE said. Before that, he managed Newmark's retail brokerage division in New York. His career history also includes a 15-year tenure at RKF, CBRE said. RKF, formerly a national boutique retail brokerage firm, was sold to Newmark in 2018.
His position as CBRE’s New York retail leader is new, a CBRE spokesperson told CoStar News.
“Michael's proven track record of success in the retail sector makes him the perfect addition to our leadership team,” said Matt Van Buren, president of the New York tri-state area for CBRE. “His years of experience will be invaluable as we continue to grow our Tri-State Retail business and develop our talent in the region.”
Retail space demand in the city, boosted by workers returning to the office and tourism recovering to just shy of the pre-pandemic level, has rebounded.
For instance, Manhattan retail leasing volume totaled 1.3 million square feet in the first quarter, a 4.6% jump from the pre-pandemic first quarter of 2019, according to a Cushman & Wakefield study. The first-quarter retail availability rate across Manhattan’s prime corridors dropped to 13.5%, the lowest rate in 10 years and a substantial improvement from the pandemic peak of 27.8% in 2021, Cushman & Wakefield said in April.
At CBRE, “I can apply the relationships and insights I've gained from my decades of experience with some of the best retail advisors in the city and the country," Taxin said in the statement. "This role is a natural fit.”
Taxin is an active member of the Real Estate Board of New York, where he was selected for what CBRE described as the “prestigious” REBNY Fellows Program, which taps two dozen prominent real estate leaders from diverse backgrounds annually for a high-impact six-month training. He is also an active member of ICSC, the retail real estate trade group, and a frequent guest speaker at its events, CBRE said.
Taxin is a licensed real estate broker in New York and Massachusetts, and he is licensed as a lawyer by the New York State Bar Association. He earned a bachelor's degree in communications from Syracuse University and his law degree from Fordham University.