Power 100 2024: Who Went Up?
Or way up, for that matter?
Breaking into Power 100 is no mean feat. But breaking into the top 10 requires the dexterity, stealth and moxie of a winning contestant on “Wipeout.”
Three firms broke into the top 10 this year, which might be a first.
All three were regulars on Power 100 before, and one individual (Jeff Sutton) had been in the top 10 a few years back. But Wharton Properties’ Sutton as well as KKR (KKR)’s Ralph Rosenberg and the Newmark (NMRK) team of Barry Gosin, David Falk and Jimmy Kuhn played 2023 and the start of 2024 on the next level.
Sutton closed two historic sales on Fifth Avenue with Prada and Gucci, netting some $1.8 billion in the process.
As for Newmark, not only did they spend the year building up a dream team of brokers, including Doug Harmon and Adam Spies, but they also landed what was perhaps the single most important assignment in the city in decades: the Signature Bank portfolio. If that’s not the kind of year that earns you a spot in the top 10, we don’t know what is.
With Rosenberg, his jump was perhaps most lopsided: He went from No. 44 to No. 7. And perhaps we have to humbly admit that at No. 44 KKR was priced too low on last year’s Power 100. But with a staggering $553 billion in assets under management, a 21 percent annual rise in the number of fees picked up, and $31 billion in fresh capital raised in the fourth quarter of 2024 alone ($69 billion raised in all of 2023), it seemed fitting that KKR should jump so high that they landed in the No. 7 spot.
Beyond the top 10 there were others who made a John Cena-worthy leap.
Ken and Winston Fisher are from one of New York’s storied real estate families and have always maintained a respectable position on Power 100, but this year they shot from 79 to 29. That’s what happens after a white-shoe law firm (Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison) signs the largest U.S. office lease of last year (765,000 square feet) at Fisher Brothers’ 1345 Avenue of the Americas.
MetroLoft’s Nathan Berman was a decent 71 last year — and, to be honest, when we started collecting names for 2024, we believed that the conversion craze that we anticipated last year might not come to fruition. But then Berman wowed us in March when we got wind of the fact that he was planning to convert the former Pfizer headquarters at 235 East 42nd Street into 1,500 apartments — and, at 672,462 square feet, it will be the largest office-to-residential conversion in the city!
This pushed Berman up to 56.
Of course, much of the movement on this year’s list is more modest.
Related Group keeps doing more and more in South Florida. They were already at a very healthy No. 58, but as their portfolio continues to mature they keep making their way up, this year reaching 47.
When you’re No. 30 (as Rudin’s Bill, Eric, Samantha and Michael were last year) it’s sometimes hard to move up unless something happens.
But, when Citadel calls and asks you to partner with Vornado Realty Trust (VNO) on one of the most coveted office developments in New York (350 Park Avenue), well, No. 20 sounds about right.
Max Gross can be reached at mgross@commercialobserver.com.
