Goldflam of Highcap Group: Time to ramp up operations

Name: Josh Goldflam Title: Managing Principal Company/Firm: Highcap Group Years with company/firm: 5 Years in field: 10 Years in real estate industry: 10 Telephone: 646-546-5880 Email: [email protected] URL: www.highcapgroup.com Real Estate Associations/Affiliations: In the current economic climate what kinds of deals are out there and who is the typical buyer? Consumer? There is obviously a lack of supply for quality product in the marketplace right now, and typical buyers are getting priced out of most deals getting bumped aside by 1031 tax free exchange buyers and REITS or private equity funds that are desperate to deploy capital into the market. The recession, rising gas prices and the housing crisis has created a new trend. Generation Y'ers are now staying in the city and the baby boomers are actually returning to the city from the suburbs. How has this affected your business and NYC retail in general? The city is thriving and has become a great place to live after getting cleaned up over the past few decades. This has created an incredible demand for residential housing and increased tourism which simply translates into a healthy retail sector. People need to eat, shop, and live their lives so businesses are paying very high rents for their spaces as their services are highly in demand. This has had a positive effect on our business for our clients looking to invest in NYC retail. One year after the devastation of hurricane sandy, the redevelopment of many of New York's damaged areas has shed some light on this disaster with additional plans for expansion in the locations affected by Sandy. How will this affect NY retail and your business in particular? Sandy was a big wake up call for NYC and showed exactly how vulnerable we are to a complete shutdown which we should never have to experience again. Hopefully we will be properly protected next time around and retailers in those areas can be confident that they can get back up and running right away. Investors and retailers are certainly thinking twice when they look at spaces that are in the flood zones. This didn't have too much of a negative impact on my business. How did your company withstand the recession and what changes have you made to grow and succeed during the recovery of the retail market? When the recession hit, the investment sales market froze and developers were losing their properties as banks stopped cutting checks. At this time I decided it was the perfect opportunity to start my current firm and ramp up operations. Although our expertise was selling investment and development properties, we were forced to change course quickly and started selling the defaulted notes on some of the same properties we sold in the boom. We adjusted with the market and ended up doing some big deals like the Cresent Club in Long Island City. Now the market has shifted back and its back to business as usual.