Robert Knakal

Senior managing director and head of New York private capital group at JLL

Last year's rank: 77

By Celia Young May 15, 2023 9:00 AM

As it turns out, a slowdown in the investment sales market was all it took to get JLL’s Bob Knakal active on social media.

“For many years people were encouraging me to use social media, and I did not do it,” Knakal said. “And, finally, I said I would give it a try at the beginning of the year. Since then, I’ve been posting regularly on LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, and I’m shocked at the reach that social media has.”

Knakal said his near-daily LinkedIn posts — which he dubbed motivational Monday, client testimonial Tuesday, current event-related post on Wednesday and, of course, throwback Thursday — have helped him develop relationships with clients and get deals. After seeing Knakal’s LinkedIn posts, one of his former Alpha Tau Omega fraternity brothers reached out to him over email to sell a small portfolio of Northeast medical buildings, Knakal said.

Outside of his online sphere of influence, Knakal closed $1.1 billion in deals in 2022 across 32 properties, though he noted that the investment sales market had certainly slowed as interest rates rose and the debt markets cooled. But Knakal still knocked out multimillion-
dollar property sales.

In his largest deal of the year, Knakal brokered the sale of Delshah Capital’s mixed-use apartment building at 22 Chapel Street in Downtown Brooklyn for $134 million. He also handled the $70 million portfolio sale of six West Village multifamily buildings. And, in the 2,222nd deal of his career, Knakal brokered HUBB NYC’s purchase of the 130-unit Williamsburg apartment property at 150 Union Avenue for $76.8 million. Not bad for a slow market.

In 2023, Knakal plans to continue doubling down on hunting out motivated sellers to keep deals flowing, despite the economic downturn.

“Particularly at times like this, you have to look at the reason why people are selling, and it’s not an ideal time for most people to be selling today,” Knakal said. “You want to look for motivation and those who have a strategic reason for wanting to transact. [On the buy side], you have to look for the people who want to be greedy at a time when the market is very challenging for a lot of folks.”