The president of the Eastern Region of Colliers International is looking to nab top brokers from his former firm Cushman & Wakefield.
Joe Harbert, who left Cushman in 2012 after eight years, wants to expand his team so Colliers can win big-ticket projects. “If you’re a 76-broker shop and you try to compete with a behemoth that has 187 or 246 brokers, you need to add brokers, and that’s one thing that we’re about to do,” he told the New York Times.
Harbert, a former public school teacher who started in real estate with the Metropolitan Transit Authority, is devoting a big chunk of his time to wooing retail brokers because he thinks that’s the market that Colliers can see its biggest growth. Two other areas to make strides: investment sales and multifamily markets. Leasing makes up about 90 percent of Colliers’ business, he told the newspapers.
Harbert plans on staying with Colliers for a good, long time. “This is really where I’d like to be,” he said. “It’s going to take a while to build this. We’re still in the ramp-up.” [NYT] – Hiten Samtani