Gil Lipkin, 29

For Gil Lipkin, real estate was always in his blood, but it wasn’t necessarily on his horizon.

Lipkin grew up in the Miami Beach area, where his family owned and operated dozens of retail and souvenir stores. But, during his time as an undergraduate at New York University’s Stern School of Business, by his own admission, he “followed the crowd into investment banking” and spent a few years working at Mizuho Bank in the media and telecommunications vertical. 

“I pretty quickly realized it wasn’t what I was looking for long term,” he said, compared to commercial real estate. “[Real estate] is both technical and quantitative, but also has a creative and softer skill side of business.” 

After returning to Stern to earn his master’s in real estate (in 15 months, no less), Lipkin entered the industry in earnest in 2021 by joining Savanna Real Estate, a firm he defined as one holding the perfect balance of being “institutional in scale while still being entrepreneurial in the field.”

He noted the investment team that he sits on has fewer than 10 professionals. 

“You have the opportunity to be very involved in large-scale transactions early on in your career,” Lipkin said. “It’s the type of place where you come in as an analyst, and you’re involved in conversations with capital partners and lenders and even the investment committee process.”

The transactions that have defined his term at Savanna have mainly occurred in New York and Miami. They include the Olara, the $1 billion, 1.6 million-square-foot, ground-up, primarily residential development in West Palm Beach, Fla., a deal that required the assemblage of eight parcels. In New York, he worked on 430 West 15th Street, an eight-story, 95,000-square-foot office property in Lower Manhattan; Savannah acquired the leasehold interest from Invesco for $85 million in late 2024.

Lipkin’s work has given him ample experience in restructurings, securing fresh bridge capital, property management, and handling difficult conversations with lenders. 

“I’m heavily involved in everything in terms of raising financings and dealing with our existing lenders,” he said. “Our investment team is structured on acquisitions and asset management.”