Cooper Weisman, 28
Director at Newmark
Wise men say only fools rush in. So Cooper Weisman, true to the nature of a wise man, does his homework.
A self-described people person, Weisman has mastered the art of the cold call in connecting with potential mentors since graduating from Indiana University in 2017 with a major in business management and a minor in entrepreneurship.
“When I was a senior in college, I started cold emailing brokers who I would see in articles in Commercial Observer, The Real Deal and the New York Post, and ultimately I got a job working at JLL with a very high-quality broker there,” Weisman said.
Weisman stayed at JLL for about 14 months until his outreach to some of the most prolific deal-makers in New York City landed him his next gig.
“I was waiting to board the plane and the woman at the front desk said ‘Neil Goldmacher, I need to talk to you about your ticket,’ ” Weisman said. He approached his fellow passenger, saying: “You don’t know who I am, but when we get back to New York, I’d love to find time to pick your brain and learn more about your success.”
Six years later, Weisman is still on Goldmacher’s team.
Some deals he’s worked on include helping law firm Kudman Trachten Aloe Posner relocate its offices to The Feil Organization’s 488 Madison Avenue with a 10,593-square-foot lease, as well as SI Engineering’s 10,108-square-foot office at Trinity Church Wall Street’s 107 Greenwich Street.
More recently, Weisman has been working on more complex negotiations that have involved tech tenants attempting to rightsize their office footprint in multiple cities. In one case, the Newmark team found a new 40,000-square-foot office in Palo Alto, Calif., for a firm that had lease expirations to deal with.
This ended up being a sublease, but it gave the unnamed client a fully furnished, turnkey office. Weisman and Goldmacher were then able to negotiate a 35,000-square-foot lease for the same client’s New York office over the course of the next 18 months.
