The downtown Manhattan rental firm has closed all of its offices, changed its business model and scaled back its brokerage activities

Kevin Ellerton and 48 Wall Street (building photo source: PropertyShark)

Real estate firm Blackstone Properties — once a major if controversial player in the downtown Manhattan rental market — has now closed all of its offices, changed its business model and scaled back its brokerage activities. Founded in 2008 by 20-somethings Kevin Ellerton and David Yomtobian, Blackstone Properties quickly grabbed a large marketshare in the Lower Manhattan rental market. At its peak, the firm had some 80 agents in five offices, and Ellerton estimated in The Real Deal that about half of all brokered rental deals in the Financial District and Battery Park City were done by Blackstone agents. [more]

Kevin Ellerton, the CEO of Blackstone Properties, which has snagged a significant market share but also drawn ire from competitors.

From the February issue: At the ripe old age of 24, Kevin Ellerton is managing to become one of
the most powerful players in the Lower Manhattan rental game. To hear
his competitors talk, he’s also one of the most loathed.
Ellerton is the CEO of Blackstone Properties, a company he started
less than two years ago with a high school friend, David Yomtobian.
(Ellerton’s company has no relation to the powerful private equity firm
the Blackstone Group.)
By Ellerton’s calculations, about half of all brokered rental deals
in the Financial District and Battery Park City are inked by Blackstone
agents. While executives at other Lower Manhattan firms say that number
might be closer to 40 percent, they grudgingly concede that Blackstone
has grabbed a formidable share of the rental market in a very short
period of time. [more]