James Nelson, Brandon Polakoff and Scott Singer

Avison Young’s New York team showed strength across investment sales capital markets over the past year aided by synergy from its three leaders: James Nelson, Scott Singer and Brandon Polakoff.

The brokerage facilitated more than $1.56 billion of deal activity across 68 transactions in investment sales, debt and equity placements from April 1, 2025, to April 1, 2026, reflecting an increased collaboration from the leadership trio.

“We’ve had better and more productive collaboration between our teams, so we’re very much a combined team,” Singer said. “There has been great overlap between us.”

Singer noted that Avison Young was well positioned to benefit from a boost in investment sales last year spurred by a flight to quality given the firm’s history of working with a wide spectrum of borrowers, from large institutional owners to family offices.

One of the signature deals Singer arranged in late 2025 involved a $147 million commercial mortgage-backed securities loan from Morgan Stanley and Société Générale to refinance the 14-story 255 Greenwich Street property developed in 1982 by Jack Resnick & Sons.

On the investment sales side, Avison Young brokered a $63 million acquisition of 68 King Street by developer Avdoo from 185 Varick Realty in Manhattan’s Hudson Square for an office-to-residential conversion

Avison Young also arranged a $49 million sale of the residential portion of the 12-story, mixed-use building at 809-811 Madison Avenue from Churchill Real Estate to Macklowe Properties along with SK Development. The pair plan to transform the site into luxury condominiums. Nelson said the complex deal that involved multiple parties and working with the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission underscores the team’s versatility.

“What we’re really good at is helping tee up the opportunity and bring it all together,” Nelson said. “Creativity is a big part of what we’re doing.”

Looking ahead, Avison Young said it’s poised for another big year, with a large pipeline of investment sales and loans putting the brokerage on pace to far exceed 2025’s volume.

“We were very focused last year on making sure we had high-quality inventory,” Polakoff said. “There was a flight to quality that really matched up with what we were offering and gave us the demand we needed to get sales over the finish line.”