Dan Gronich, SIOR, is an executive managing director in Newmark’s Midtown Manhattan office, where he focuses on office and retail tenant representation in New York City. Over the course of his career, Mr. Gronich has developed strategies and executed projects spanning nearly all classifications for tenants, owners, developers and investors. His specialties include strategic planning, transaction structuring, lease negotiation and optimum asset utilization. One of Newmark’s most accomplished professionals, Mr. Gronich has consummated leasing and sales transactions worth billions of dollars and has won the Real Estate Board of New York’s (REBNY) Henry Hart Rice Most Ingenious Deal of the Year award twice.
Mr. Gronich is a highly creative and visionary professional who constantly seeks non-traditional solutions to real estate requirements. The resulting transactions have both defined a client’s image in New York and redefined the area and/or building housing the new tenancy. In most cases, these deals also involved the re-conception, re-organization and re-alignment of standard office or retail space into signature destination locations. Mr. Gronich is also known for proactively developing concepts to promote a company’s brand or product through innovative use of real estate. His most noteworthy transactions include:
- The representation of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security in long-term leases of 140,000 square feet at 1 Penn Plaza and 266,000 square feet at 601 West 26th Street, to immediately replace the facilities lost at 6 World Trade Center on September 11th. These transactions, which ensured the continuous operation of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agencies in New York City, had a combined value exceeding $200 million. The West 26th Street lease earned Mr. Gronich his second REBNY Henry Hart Rice Most Ingenious Deal of the Year award.
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The concept development and relocation of the world-famous FAO Schwarz toy store to the General Motors Building on Fifth Avenue in New York City. Mr. Gronich later renegotiated that lease, expanding FAO Schwarz’s retail space to
65,000 square feet and its office space to 31,000 square feet in a new $100 million transaction. Mr. Gronich was also responsible for creating the 56,000-square-foot FAO Schwarz megastore at the Forum Shops in Las Vegas as well as
superstores in Boston, Chicago and San Francisco.
- The concept development and execution of the Russian Trade & Cultural Center at the World Trade Center in New York City. This 90,000-square-foot lease, which established a location for Russian businesses, professionals and residents to gather in an environment promoting their nation, garnered Mr. Gronich his first REBNY Henry Hart Rice Most Ingenious Deal of the Year award.
- The concept development of a National Basketball Association (NBA) themed retail store and conclusion of a 35,000-square-foot lease valued at $60 million for the original NBA store at 666 Fifth Avenue.
Mr. Gronich has represented numerous other major corporations, international banks, private equity firms, hedge funds, retailers and investors in acquiring and/or disposing of New York City office and retail space.
Mr. Gronich became part of the Newmark real estate powerhouse when BGC, having already acquired Newmark in 2011, acquired the assets of Grubb & Ellis Company in 2012. Mr. Gronich joined Grubb & Ellis in 1994, following the firm’s acquisition of his real estate services company, Gronich & Company, Inc. For the next few years, he held both leadership and brokerage positions at Grubb & Ellis, including president/CEO and chairman of the New York office, where he was responsible for the day-to-day operation of the firm, before re-focusing on the brokerage side of the business as vice chairman.
Prior to his real estate career, Mr. Gronich was a tax supervisor at Touche Ross, which merged into Deloitte. He is an inactive certified public accountant.
Partial Client List
Office Clients:
- Banco del Estado de Chile
- CorpBanca
- Labaton Sucharow
- Landmark Worldwide
- NewOak Capital
- Offit Capital Advisors
- Pine Brook Road Partners
- The Rohatyn Group
- U.S. Department of Homeland Security
Retail Clients:
- Bloomingdale’s
- Lucky Strike Entertainment
- Margaritaville
Professional Achievements
- Selected by Real Estate Weekly as one of the “50 Titans of New York Real Estate in the last 50 Years” (50th Anniversary Issue, September 2005)
- Selected in 1998 by the brokerage division of REBNY to receive its highest honor, The Broker Recognition Award, given each year to “honor a broker whose career distinctions include personal and professional integrity, long term leadership and prominence in the brokerage community”
Professional Affiliations
- Real Estate Board of New York (REBNY)
- Board of governors, 1985 - Present
- Executive committee, 1988 - 2003
- Member of the ethics, leasing, sales, retail, audit and finance committees
- Member, American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA)
- Member, International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC)
- Member, Society of Industrial and Office Realtors (SIOR), the highest National Association of Realtors designation available to specialists in industrial and office real estate, 1986 - 2017
- Former member, Urban Land Institute (ULI) and its Entertainment Development Council
- Board of directors, The New York City Public Development Corporation, during the administration of Mayor Ed Koch, with additional positions on its executive, finance and development committees
Personal Affiliations
- Board of trustees, New York City Police Foundation, with additional positions on the contracts and audit committees
- Board of directors, Fifth Avenue Business Improvement District
- Former partner, New York City Partnership. Selected in June 1992 as one of 12 CEOs to travel with Mayor David Dinkins to London and Paris to promote expansion of European companies in New York City
Education
Mr. Gronich holds a Master of Business Administration degree from New York University and a Bachelor of Science degree from Columbia College. He attended the Lawrenceville School.