From the October issue: As if today’s leasing market wasn’t challenging enough, New York’s
commercial real estate brokers have one more thing to contend with:
demanding landlords. Whether it is an increase in the number of phone calls, requests for
weekly face-to-face meetings, or a sudden mandate of updated daily
reports on individual properties, all over town there are more stories
of landlords who now want up-to-the-minute information on what their
respective brokers are doing to fill their space. And in some quarters, this newfound neediness is starting to grate. “It’s a pain in the ass,” said a broker at one of the top firms who
asked to remain anonymous. “Landlords are micromanaging the process and
you need a lot of handholding and a lot of paper.