Bob Knakal NYC

Bob Knakal NYC NYC Investment Sales Broker

09/25/2026

Why does specialization increase your probability of success?

Real estate is a probability-based business. Throughout my career, I’ve found that specialization puts those probabilities more firmly in your favor.

I’ve always said, generalists get considered, specialists get retained.

My own value proposition is intentionally narrow. I sell vacant buildings. I represent sellers. I work exclusively on exclusive assignments. I work in New York City.

That focus has allowed me to develop expertise through thousands of transactions.

Having sold more than 2,400 buildings gives my clients something much more valuable than a statistic. It gives them the benefit of experience.

I’ve seen the strategies and tactics buyers use to create leverage during a transaction. I understand how those situations develop, how to respond, and how to keep my seller in the strongest possible position.

Every transaction adds another lesson. Every lesson strengthens the advice I can give the next client.

Expertise creates an advantage, and specialization is one of the best ways I know to build it.

Los Angeles, here we come.On Monday, October 5, I’ll be hosting a special Knakal Knetworking event with Nicole Mihalka o...
09/25/2026

Los Angeles, here we come.

On Monday, October 5, I’ll be hosting a special Knakal Knetworking event with Nicole Mihalka of CBRE on the rooftop of the Delphi Hotel in Los Angeles.

This will be a great opportunity to connect with people in the commercial real estate community, talk shop, exchange ideas, and spend some time together in a relaxed setting.

I’ll also be signing copies of our book, Selling Buildings: Maximizing Prices and Profits in Commercial Real Estate.

Admission is $50 and includes one cocktail, light bites, and a copy of the book, with an opportunity to have it signed at the event.

Monday, October 5
5:00 to 7:00 PM
Rooftop of the Delphi Hotel / UCA Terraza
550 S. Flower Street, Los Angeles

Nicole and I are looking forward to seeing many old friends and meeting plenty of new ones.

Space is limited, so register here:
https://bit.ly/BKREAinLA

09/25/2026

One of the most important objectives in marketing is becoming top of mind.

My broker coach gave me the idea years ago to create a baseball card, and it has become one of the pieces we regularly send to property owners.

We print it on very heavy stock. It feels substantial. It looks good. And it gets noticed when someone is going through the mail.

Now, does every person who receives it call me? Of course not. In fact, someone might pick it up, look at it for three seconds, think, “Oh, Bob Knakal,” and throw it directly into the garbage.

To me, that can still be a tremendous success. Why? Because for those three seconds, Bob Knakal was planted in that person’s brain.

Then another mailing arrives the next month.
“Oh, Bob Knakal.”

Then another.
And another.

The objective is not necessarily to make somebody sell a building today. Most owners are not going to sell today. The objective is to be the person they think of when the day comes that they DO need to transact.

Death, divorce, taxes, a partnership dispute, an estate issue, a change in investment strategy, or any one of countless circumstances can suddenly create a need to sell. When that moment arrives, you want the owner thinking, “Knakal. That is the guy who is always sending me information.”

That is what top-of-mind awareness is all about.

Marketing is not an event. It is a process.

You may not see an immediate return from every call, every mailing, every piece of content, or every interaction. But consistent activity compounds over time. Do the right things consistently enough, for long enough, and when the opportunity presents itself, you have dramatically increased the chances that your phone is the one that rings.

Consistency matters.
Repetition matters.
Staying top of mind matters.

A big thank you to Sofia Melo, The Science of Scaling Podcast, and HubSpot for following me around for a Day in the Life of Bob Knakal and capturing what goes into the process.

You can watch the entire video here:
https://youtu.be/yybIRmF83ek?si=61MufGzSwM1avtie

Relationships are what this business is all about.It was great having Alex Lai visit the BKREA Map Room.Alex serves on t...
09/24/2026

Relationships are what this business is all about.

It was great having Alex Lai visit the BKREA Map Room.

Alex serves on the board of a large investment company in Hong Kong, and we recently had the opportunity to help his company sell a building here in New York City.

One of the things I have always loved about New York real estate is how global the business really is. An owner can be halfway around the world, but when it comes time to make an important decision about a New York asset, local market knowledge, relationships and ex*****on still matter enormously.

Alex and I spent some time going through the maps, looking at the market and talking about what is happening block by block.

That is always my favorite part.

Technology has changed. Capital sources have changed. The market has changed many times over my 40+ years in the business.

But one thing has not changed:

Know your market. Know your clients. And take care of them.

Great spending time with you, Alex. Thanks for stopping by the Map Room.

Another handwritten note from the boxes—and another reminder of how much these little things can mean many years later.T...
09/24/2026

Another handwritten note from the boxes—and another reminder of how much these little things can mean many years later.

This one came from our good friend Paul Salvatore, who was Massey Knakal's labor attorney at Proskauer Rose for more than 20 years. Paul is one of the finest labor lawyers in the country, but to us, he was much more than outside counsel. He also served on our Advisory Board and provided Paul Massey, me and our senior management team with tremendous counsel, perspective and guidance over many years.

Each holiday season, we tried to find ways to thank the people who had helped us throughout the year. One year, we gave each of our Advisory Board members an oversized coffee-table picture book of New York as a small token of our appreciation for the time, wisdom and guidance they had given us.

Paul responded with this handwritten note.

The exact year is a little fuzzy. The date in the upper right corner appears to say January 2008, but Paul writes in the note, "Let's hope '09 is not as bad as people fear." So either the date should have been January 2009, or everyone was already so worried about the economy that we were looking two years ahead! Given what was happening around that time, either seems possible.

What isn't fuzzy is how much the note meant to me.

We gave Paul a gift because we appreciated him. He certainly didn't need to send anything in return. But he took a few minutes, picked up a pen, and wrote a personal note expressing his appreciation.

And here I am, nearly two decades later, still holding onto it.

There is something about a handwritten note that an email or text message simply can't replicate. Someone had to sit down, think about what they wanted to say, write it in their own hand, put it in an envelope and send it. It takes just a little more effort—and maybe that's precisely why it means a little more.

I've always believed that handwritten notes are completely underrated.

The coffee-table book we gave Paul? I couldn't tell you today which book it was.

But I still have his note.

That probably tells you everything you need to know about the enduring power of a thoughtful gesture.

09/23/2026

When everyone else pulls back, that is often the time to push harder.

In real estate sales, consistent and strategic contact is critical, especially in Manhattan, where properties trade infrequently.

You cannot wait until an owner is ready to sell to get their attention. You have to build familiarity long before the opportunity exists.

Stay visible. Stay consistent. Stay top of mind.

When the time comes to transact, you want to be the first call.

Four decades in New York commercial real estate gives you a powerful perspective on what actually builds a lasting caree...
09/23/2026

Four decades in New York commercial real estate gives you a powerful perspective on what actually builds a lasting career.

In this episode of The Bob Knakal Show, Leslie Himmel, co-founder and managing partner of Himmel + Meringoff Properties, shares the experiences that shaped her approach to investing, relationships, preparation, and long-term ownership.

Leslie talks about:

How she created opportunities when there was no obvious path into the room.

Why deep market knowledge meant walking Manhattan block by block.

How long-term ownership shaped the way Himmel + Meringoff evaluated opportunities.

Why relationships still matter so much in commercial real estate.

And why preparation remains one of the strongest sources of confidence in business.

This is a valuable conversation for anyone building a long-term career in commercial real estate.

Watch the full episode here: https://youtu.be/aWpF1LFIyng

Special thanks to CREXI for sponsoring The Bob Knakal Show and supporting conversations that help move the commercial real estate industry forward.

Too many brokers measure activity instead of results.100 dials means nothing if you didn’t speak to anyone.Stop counting...
09/22/2026

Too many brokers measure activity instead of results.

100 dials means nothing if you didn’t speak to anyone.

Stop counting dials. Start counting connections.

Get the right people on the phone. Have real conversations. Ask the questions that matter. Then do it again next week.

Consistency builds relationships. Relationships create opportunities. And opportunities turn into transactions.

Make connections, not calls.

Two for the price of four! Four parcels – Two new buildings. In land assemblage, the whole is usually worth more than th...
09/22/2026

Two for the price of four! Four parcels – Two new buildings.

In land assemblage, the whole is usually worth more than the sum of the parts. In these transactions, due to two unusually shaped properties and different zoning districts, the sum of the parts were worth more than the whole.

Suggesting a tax lot subdivision, and a joint venture development strategy, which left one of the unwilling sellers with a retail condo interest, were keys to maximizing the value of all the component properties.

This was one of the most interesting deals we ever worked on. We created two development sites and changed the skyline in this newly emerging neighborhood

1205 and 1225 Broadway were two adjacent office and retail properties with short-term leases. They gave us the majority of the blockfront, but not all of it.

846 Sixth Avenue was an odd trapezoid-shaped property with 68 feet on frontage. The same ownership group also owned 1227 Broadway, which created a joint site with 289 feet of frontage along 30th Street. 1227 also completed the entire blockfront between 29th and 30th Streets.

There were two different zoning districts for Sixth Avenue and for Broadway. When hired to sell the two Broadway properties, we immediately went to the owners of 846 and 1227 to see if they were willing to sell. There were two partners – one willing to sell and one who was reluctant. We encouraged the owners of these to subdivide the Sixth Avenue property to effectively “square off” the Broadway site. The buyer of the other two Broadway buildings (John Lam) was eager to purchase a portion of this newly subdivided property. This site is now the home of the new Virgin Hotel.

The remaining Sixth Avenue property had two partners, one of whom wanted to sell and one of who was reluctant. We structured a transaction where a condo developer (Alchemy Properties) bought into the partnership that owned the property and paid enough to buyout the motivated seller. The seller who was reluctant, had their interest in the partnership converted to an equity interest in the retail condo when the new residential condo was completed – a built-in 1031 exchange!

Here is what the sellers of the component properties had to say:

“We thank Bob Knakal for all his hard work, diligence, honesty, ingenuity, and integrity in brokering the sale of 1205-1225 Broadway. This is the second such transaction effectuated by Bob for us and, if such services are needed in the future, we will not look anywhere else but Bob Knakal.” - Calvin C. Haddad
Closing Price: $87,900,000

“Our partnership group did not always agree. Bob Knakal perfectly shepherded us through a very complex deal”. - Howard Waxman
Closing Price: $36,800,000

09/21/2026

Out of thousands of transactions, some deals stay with you forever.

Back in the mid-80s, I was representing the Cromwell Group on a property involving Kinney Parking with valuable air rights.

I called Larry Friedland, explained the opportunity, and that same day, he decided to buy it.

A unique property, the right buyer, and perfect timing ultimately led to the construction of a two-story retail building.

After more than 2,300 transactions, this one remains one of the most memorable.

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