Christopher Peck, Michael Gigliotti and Kevin Davis

For JLL’s New York capital markets team, led by Christopher Peck and Michael Gigliotti, and JLL Americas CEO for hotels and hospitality Kevin Davis, 2022 proved to be an impressive year on the transaction front: more than $23 billion in debt, equity and loan sales. 

Focused both on New York City and national markets such as Boca Raton and Southern California, the JLL team’s loan portfolio included 313 deals, with $7.6 billion in the multifamily residential space, $5.8 billion across 28 deals in the retail sector, $2.5 billion in 13 hotel and hospitality deals, and $2.2 billion over 28 deals in the office sector. 

Of the team’s 135 multifamily deals, few were bigger than the $295 million recapitalization of 420 Carroll Street, a 360-unit housing property in Gowanus, Brooklyn, where the trio secured a $176 million loan through Bank OZK while showcasing the firm’s “One JLL” philosophy that promotes both specialization and collaboration across business lines.  

“That dedicated practice on both the sales and debt sides has really helped us on multi-
family,” Gigliotti said. “Luck, preparation — call it what it is — but our dedication to specializing and not being generalists when it comes to multifamily has really helped a lot.” 

Perhaps no transactions summed up the efficacy of JLL’s capital markets office than 520 Fifth Avenue, which required the trio to originate $540 million from Bank OZK and the Carlyle Group on behalf of Rabina to build the city’s newest supertall mixed-use skyscraper — and subsequently use JLL’s leasing network to fill the building. 

“With that you had expertise on the office side, expertise on the multifamily/condo side, and our leasing team was able to help us pitch to lenders on how it would get leased up,” Gigliotti explained. “And we were able to pitch to the owner that when you hire a leasing agent, you should hire JLL because you want that concerted effort as a team, where we’re going as a unified front to the lender to get your deal capitalized and to the tenants to get your deal leased.” 

“That’s what we want to be here,” he added. “We don’t want to be a single-service operation.”   

The finished product of 520 Fifth — a 450,000-square-foot structure featuring retail, offices and 98 apartments — is expected to be the second-tallest building on Fifth Avenue after the Empire State Building.   

JLL’s DEI initiatives also made an impact in 2022. Not only has the firm continued its partnership with Project Destined, but also over the last year 37 percent of all transactions were completed by diverse team members, an increase from 11 percent in 2021. Moreover, three out of four new hires last year were diverse and came out of the firm’s summer internship program. —B.P.