Press

New York lawmakers are reportedly considering a new 1 percent tax on all-cash home purchases over $1 million. The proposal is designed to raise revenue and help close New York City’s budget gap.

Commercial real estate veteran Bob Knakal launched a new speaker series and expanded his Knakal Dealmakers Knetwork mentorship initiative, delivering a keynote on the three pillars of elite performance: passion, expertise through specialization, and disciplined daily execution.

Real Estate titans Bob Knakal and Don Tepman headlined the annual NYC Real Estate Gala, an exclusive evening uniting New York City’s most influential developers, investors, and brokers at Hudson Yards.

BKREA: Where Market Intelligence Meets Execution

Every housing conversation in New York City seems to begin with the same flawed premise: “How does the government find enough money to create housing?”

Building Value: How Bob Knakal Is Rewriting the Playbook with BKREA

People talk a lot today about motivation, how to find it, how to sustain it, how to “unlock” it.

Genessy Jaramillo, Managing Director and Head of the Transferable Development Rights Team at BKREA, earned Transferable Development Rights Broker of the Year honors at the 2026 RED Awards. Chairman and CEO Bob Knakal calls her a rising star in New York City commercial real estate.

Knakal’s investment sales firm, launched on the heels of his exodus from JLL, has closed 43 transactions totaling $1.78 billion in Manhattan real estate. As it makes its way through 2026, the firm has at least 75 listings that have the potential to bring in about $4 billion for his clients, according to Knakal.

BKREA was founded out of a long-standing observation that the New York City investment sales market, despite its scale and sophistication, was still not being served at the level of rigor and precision that modern institutional capital demands.

Bob Knakal launches The Knakal Dealmakers Knetwork, a live mentorship community for brokers and sales professionals. Drawing from a 42-year career brokering 2,398 buildings worth $24 billion, members receive twice-monthly sessions on sales, negotiation, branding, and elite performance. Launches May 5, 2026.

Extell scooped up the property at 57 E. 55th St. for $19 million, Bob Knakal of BKREA investment sales brokerage in New York, told CoStar News. Knakal represented the seller, Kairos Investment Management. Kairos bought the property in February for $15 million in a foreclosure auction, CoStar data shows.

Barnett’s bid beat out a hospitality operator, foreign consulates and a group of crypto investors seeking to turn the Friar’s Club into a private club, dubbed the Crypto Castle. Bob Knakal and Tom Brady of BKREA brokered the deal on behalf of Kairos.

For several years, the narrative surrounding New York City office buildings, particularly Class B and Class C assets, was relentlessly negative. The headlines were dominated by remote work, shrinking footprints, weak leasing demand, rising vacancy and the notion that traditional office use might never fully recover.

The mixed-use property located at 57 East 55th Street in Manhattan has been sold for $19,000,000. The asset encompasses a total area of 14,541 square feet, resulting in a price per square foot of $1,306.

Developer Gary Barnett’s Extell Development has purchased New York City’s former home of comedy, the Friars Club building at 57 East 55th Street, for $19 million, sources told Commercial Observer.

The gala is co-hosted by Tepman and the Big Apple’s uber-investment-sales guy, Bob Knakal of BKREA, whose online handle has 50,400 followers.

Bob Knakal’s One 21 Las Vegas keynote addressed how boutique commercial real estate firms can outperform institutional platforms through decision speed, information depth, and incentive alignment.

Every few years, Albany revives an idea that may sound politically attractive but is economically destructive: the pied-à-terre tax.

The inaugural BKREA White Paper examines ELURP — a new regulatory pathway that could reduce certain NYC land use approvals from 7+ months to 90 days — and is also featured in the April 2025 Development Site Monthly Newsletter.

With a career spanning more than four decades, Bob Knakal has become one of the most influential figures in New York City commercial real estate. As the founder and CEO of BK Real Estate Advisors, his impact extends beyond transactions—shaping brokerage models, mentoring future leaders, and redefining how investment property sales are executed.

Bob Knakal and the BKREA Team Proprietary dataset of 29,000+ NYC property transactions reveals the two variables that consistently predict market peaks and troughs.

For most of my career, I have told clients that if you want to understand value in New York City real estate, you need to understand three things: location, zoning and the market. Study those variables carefully, and you can make informed decisions about what a property is worth and what it can become.

Visionary leadership is often associated with bold predictions and disruptive reinvention. In reality, it is far more disciplined. It is built on clarity, conviction, and an unwavering commitment to long-term value creation.

Bob Knakal, Chairman and CEO of BK Real Estate Advisors, has been recognized by Biz Insight Global as one of the Most Influential Business Leaders to Watch in 2026.

For more than forty years, Bob Knakal’s career in New York’s commercial real estate market has centered on one guiding idea: a brokerage firm succeeds when its clients succeed. Markets evolve, buildings change hands, and investment strategies shift with economic cycles, but the fundamental purpose of the brokerage profession remains constant. The role of a broker is to guide property owners and investors through complex decisions and help them achieve the best possible outcome for their assets.

Few figures in commercial real estate have shaped the landscape with as much breadth, depth, and sustained influence as Bob Knakal, Chairman and CEO of BK Real Estate Advisors (BKREA). With a career spanning more than four decades, Knakal’s trajectory reflects both the evolution of the investment sales business and his own dynamic capacity to innovate, lead, and redefine what it means to be a top-tier real estate advisor in an increasingly complex and competitive world.

Over the past several years, the landscape of multifamily lending in New York City, particularly in the rent-regulated sector, has undergone a dramatic transformation. With the collapse of Signature Bank and the pullback of New York Community Bank (now operating as Flagstar), J.P. Morgan Chase has emerged as the dominant lender in this space. You have, in effect, become the 800-pound gorilla.

There is a number quietly shaping the future of housing in New York City: $72.45 per hour. That is the minimum all-in compensation required for construction workers on certain residential projects over 150 units under the state’s 2-year-old 485x development incentive.

BKREA releases the most comprehensive Manhattan investment sales study ever published — analyzing 29,363 transactions across 42 years to document market cycles, federal tax policy impacts, and the deepest below-trend slowdown in recorded history, triggered by New York’s 2019 rent-regulation overhaul.

Groundbreaking analysis of 29,363 Manhattan investment sales from 1984–2025 maps four decades of transaction cycles, tax-policy impacts, and the lasting market disruption caused by New York's 2019 rent-regulation law — the most comprehensive Manhattan investment sales dataset ever assembled.

In New York City real estate, longevity alone commands respect. Dominance commands attention. Reinvention, however, is what defines legacy.

New York City’s market-rate apartment rents are reaching levels that would have seemed unimaginable just a few years ago. In February, the median rent in Manhattan reached $5,000 per month for the first time in history.

Genessy Jaramillo, Managing Director at BKREA and NAIOP NYC Developing Leader Chair, joined industry leaders as a featured panelist at a February 13 discussion exploring the forces shaping New York City’s future skyline, development strategy, and capital markets.

BKREA has appointed Baruch Edelkopf as Managing Director, focused on development sites and investment sales across Brooklyn and the outer boroughs. Edelkopf brings 12 years of experience and over $250 million in completed transactions, primarily across middle-market deals in Brooklyn and Queens.

For more than four decades, I have been tracking investment property sales in Manhattan south of 96th Street. Within this market, there are 27,649 investment properties, and, since 1984, we have meticulously tracked every sale.

The Real Deal has named Bob Knakal one of its “Top 100 Real Estate Titans of the Year,” recognizing his enduring impact on New York City investment sales and his continued leadership as one of the most accomplished commercial real estate brokers in the country.

Savills’ planned acquisition of Eastdil Secured, one of the biggest and likely most consequential in the real estate advisory business, isn’t making Bob Knakal rethink his decision to go out on his own.

BKREA is highlighting New York City’s newly introduced Expedited Land Use Review Procedure , a policy change designed to significantly shorten development approval timelines. The reform could reshape how developers, landowners, and investors evaluate entitlement risk, capital deployment, and project feasibility across the city.

The commercial real estate industry is undergoing a profound transformation driven by data, analytics, and intelligent systems. At the center of this evolution is Bob Knakal, founder and leader of BKREA, one of the most respected commercial real estate advisory firms in the United States.

Knakal got into real estate by accident. He supposedly applied for a summer internship at Coldwell Banker in 1981, thinking it was a bank. Whether that’s apocryphal or not, Knakal is now one of the city’s top investment sales brokers.

For decades, the massive Kingsbridge Armory in the Bronx has stood empty — a cavernous structure occupying an entire city block in a borough that has long struggled with some of the highest unemployment rates in New York City and the nation. Few development failures better illustrate the consequences of public policy divorced from economic reality than the armory.

In an era defined by rapid technological change, economic uncertainty, and evolving leadership expectations, very few business leaders stand out for the right reasons. Fewer still earn trust across generations while continuing to innovate at the highest level.

I’ve loved James Bond movies since I was a boy. Everything about them — the music, the cars, the villains, the confidence, the sense that one person, armed with better intelligence, could outmaneuver everyone else.

For decades, commercial real estate investment sales brokerage has relied heavily on memory, relationships and anecdotal experience. Brokers would say things like, “He’s a good buyer,” or “They always retrade,” or “That group is aggressive.” Sometimes those assessments were accurate. Sometimes they were not. But they were rarely quantified.

BKREA, the New York City investment sales firm founded by Bob Knakal, has introduced an AI-powered Developer Ranking System that transforms decades of transaction history into a data-driven framework, giving property owners unprecedented insight into buyer behavior, execution reliability, and negotiating leverage.

BKREA’s February market update spotlights the Long Island City rezoning as a pivotal development shaping New York City’s next real estate cycle. Chairman Bob Knakal notes the initiative signals renewed momentum for development sites and underscores shifting investor focus across the metropolitan market.

BKREA Senior Vice President of Transactions Ryan Candel recently joined Ithaca College's Real Estate Club Career Connections series, sharing insights on his brokerage career and strategies students can use to build relationships and launch successful careers in commercial real estate.

There is an old rule in real estate: When the math stops working, everything else eventually follows.

For over four decades, Bob Knakal has stood out in commercial real estate not just for extraordinary production, but for sustained excellence, strategic innovation, and culture-building.

The world’s largest firms proudly position themselves as “full-service” platforms, offering investment sales, leasing, financing, equity placement, property management and advisory services under one roof. On the surface, this appears to benefit clients. More services suggest more capability, more reach and more resources.

The NAIOP New York City Metro Chapter congratulates chapter member and Developing Leaders Chair Genessy Jaramillo on being named a 2026 NAIOP and Prologis Inclusion in CRE Scholarship recipient, recognizing her as one of fifteen emerging professionals selected nationwide this year.

Bob Knakal, Chairman & CEO of BKREA and one of the most respected voices in commercial real estate, recently led a Lunch & Learn session with brokers at Lee & Associates, focused on broker best practices, professional development, and strategies for maximizing long-term success.

Some leaders don’t just follow markets, they understand cycles, people, and timing. They believe that doing the right thing for clients never goes out of style, and that excellence only comes from going all-in, every single time. Over decades, this philosophy has reshaped how relationships are built, how information is valued, and how firms grow from the inside out.