With the economy in the doldrums, it s no surprise that commercial real estate firms have been receiving a lot of resumes. But with the market for office space tepid, job openings in commercial real estate appear to be relatively scarce.
The development of new office, retail, industrial and multifamily buildings is at its lowest level in a decade nationally. According to the National Association of Realtors, 16.7 percent of all commercial office space across the country is now vacant, as is 12.8 percent of all retail space. The overall office vacancy rate in Manhattan was around 12.4 percent in July, according to Colliers ABR.
At CB Richard Ellis, the company plans to bring in two new hires over the next month and a half for its New York operations. In a year, the company might bring in six to eight people total, said Susy Reingold, Director, Leasing, for CB Richard Ellis. There are many more knocking at her door.
“You ve got an awful lot of graduates looking for jobs,” she said. Overall, candidates trying to break into the field generally fall into three categories: some just out of school, some out for two to four years, and others who might be 10 or 20 years out of college and be working in sales in another industry.
A recent Colliers report said that an increasing number of commercial brokers around 50 percent are likely to have other professional backgrounds before coming to commercial real estate. Reingold said she looks to hire those with New York commercial real estate experience, followed by those with commercial experience in another market, and lastly, those with backgrounds in sales “of some sort or another.”
Once on board, new hires have mentors, non-broker managers, and training sessions one night a week.
At Cushman and Wakefield, resources like the company s emerging brokers group bring in guest speakers and serve as venues for social networking, according to spokesman Dwayne Doherty.
Commercial real estate has traditionally been a Caucasian male-dominated industry, but women have made considerable headway over the years. At Jones Lang La LaSalle, for example, around 31 percent of the company s employees throughout the U.S. are women. “We have a lot more women then we used to in the industry,” said Reingold. In the past, she said, women tended to be last in, and first out during tougher economic times. Now, says Reingold, who herself has been in commercial real estate for the last 32 years, “their staying power is better.”