Andreas Efthymiou.
Andreas Efthymiou, 28
Director at Cushman & Wakefield
Andreas Efthymiou first got interested in real estate, in general, while accompanying his father, a general contractor, to work sites.
However, it was not until after college at Arizona State’s W.P. Carey School of Business, and during a stint as an operations analyst for publishing giant Simon & Schuster, that Efthymiou found his entry into commercial real estate. Through an acquaintance, he landed an interview for a junior analyst position at Cushman & Wakefield (CWK).
Five years later, Efthymiou is now a director at the brokerage firm, involved deeply in the investment sales practice across all different asset classes. His most notable deal as of late involved leading the Cushman & Wakefield team in representing Alexandria Real Estate Equities in its acquisition of 47-50 30th Street in Long Island City, Queens. Alexandria, one of the nation’s leading life sciences and lab space developers, plans to redevelop the site into a life sciences hub.
Efthymiou’s biggest deal to date, though, was the sale of 16305-16325 Archer Avenue in Jamaica, N.Y. The development site, with approximately 540,000 buildable square feet, traded for $55 million in 2018 — the biggest development site sale in the Queens neighborhood that year. The buyer plans to redevelop it into a 605-unit residential building with retail.
As for work coming out of the pandemic, Efthymiou is bullish. He said he sees now as the time to build further connections and to focus on closing deals already in the works.
“On paper, post-COVID [shutdown] looks pretty promising,” Efthymiou told CO in late September. “Our team, at this point in time, is exclusively marketing over $500 million worth of investment opportunities, and we also have $100 million worth of properties under contract that are slated to be closed next year.”
