REBNY will present awards this year to Donald Zucker (the Bernard H. Mendik Award for Lifetime Achievement), Mike Fishman (the Harry B. Helmsley Award for Distinguished Service), Dottie Herman (the Kenneth R. Gerrety Award for Humanitarianism), Woody Heller (the Louis Smadbeck Award for Commercial Brokerage), Dick Concannon (the George M. Brooker Award for Management) and William Montana (the Young Real Estate Man of the Year Award).
Despite being honored this week for his youth, Mr. Montana, the chair of REBNY’s commercial brokerage division and a managing director at Studley, has been attending the banquet for nearly 25 years. “This is the event I remember all the young people in the industry wanting to go to,” Mr. Montana said. Citing the expensive ticket price, he recalled that fledgling real estate pros with modest bank accounts would go to considerable lengths to procure an invitation from their firms.
“You want to be in that room,” Mr. Montana said. “You want access. Smart people go there with an agenda: ‘I need to see the following five people, make or solidify relationships with them and get some face time.’” In another example of his intelligent approach to the banquet, Mr. Montana says his acceptance speech will be “short, sweet and loud.”
