Town to open its first Brooklyn office

Town Residential, the brokerage which bills itself as “Manhattan real estate experts,” is making its first foray into Brooklyn, The Real Deal has learned.

The Brooklyn office will be Town’s eleventh, with its other ten locations in Manhattan. “Town is always looking at opportunities throughout the city to grow our presence, and Brooklyn is, of course, at the top of the list,” Joseph Sitt, chairman and CEO of Town Residential, said in a statement to TRD today. “Ignoring a market as strong as Brooklyn is right now would simply be foolish.”

Sitt added that the firm did not “have an announcement to make at this time,” though a company insider said the new office is likely to be in Williamsburg. Another source familiar with the search said that Town is yet to sign a lease for the space. Ari LeFauve, a Town managing director currently based out of the firm’s Soho office, will be heading up the Brooklyn operation. LeFauve declined to comment.

At the time of TRD’s annual ranking of Manhattan residential firms in May, Town had $356 million in exclusive listings, putting them sixth on the list. The firm is already active in Brooklyn, with rental portfolios such as the Dixon townhouse properties across several Brooklyn neighborhoods, as well as sales listings in Williamsburg, Park Slope, Carroll Gardens and Downtown Brooklyn.

Town will be stepping into an increasingly crowded and competitive marketplace in Brooklyn, as brokerages continue to tap into the borough’s seemingly insatiable appetite for development amid rapidly escalating prices. The Corcoran Group, Douglas Elliman and Brown Harris Stevens all increased their Brooklyn-agent head counts at least 32 percent in the last three years, according to an analysis by TRD last month.