New Jersey State of the Market

As Principal and Vice President of Investment at Advance Realty, Alex Cocoziello focuses on risk management, capital allocation, and investment strategy helping to ensure seamless execution of the firm’s core, value-added and opportunistic real estate transactions. Prior to joining Advance, Alex worked as a trader and market-maker for Bank of America Merrill Lynch’s Global Markets Division on the Event-Driven Equity Team. In this role, Alex specialized in the trading of equity securities focusing on risk arbitrage of corporate mergers and acquisitions, distressed equity, and post-reorganizational equity. His responsibilities included managing firm capital in risk situations, providing fundamental and technical market analysis, daily trading commentary, and corporate earnings analysis to institutional clients such as asset managers, pension funds, mutual funds, and hedge funds. Alex holds a BS in Industrial and Labor Relations from Cornell University, and an MS in Real Estate with a concentration in finance and investment from New York University’s Schack Institute of Real Estate.

Varun Agnihotri joined New Jersey Community Capital in September 2022 as Managing Director of Portfolio Management. He is responsible for setting investment strategy, monitoring the lending portfolio, advising the real estate development team, and supporting the leadership in implementing the strategic vision. Before joining New Jersey Community Capital, Varun served in a fiduciary capacity as Senior Vice President of Investments at Newport Capital Group to institutional and high net-worth clients. He was a Mergers & Acquisitions Trader at Twin Capital Management, a privately-owned hedge fund. He began his career as a Quantitative Analyst for a New Jersey hedge fund focused on a pairs trading strategy. Varun is a member of the Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) Institute and the CFA Society in New York. He studied Mathematics of Finance and Actuarial Science at The New Jersey Institute of Technology and earned the right to use the CFA designation.

Mr. Wolfe is the Managing Partner in the Property Tax Department at Skoloff & Wolfe, PC, where he focuses his practice on representing taxpayers in significant real estate tax appeals and property tax related matters. He has extensive experience in all types of property tax appeals, including hotel, multi-family, retail, office, and industrial properties. Mr. Wolfe frequently counsels clients on the property tax implications of the development, acquisition, and disposition of significant assets. He also counsels clients with respect to property tax exemptions and PILOT agreements. Mr. Wolfe serves on the Board of the National Association of Property Tax Attorneys (NAPTA) and as the Co-Chair of the Real Property Tax Practice Committee of the New Jersey State Bar Association. Mr. Wolfe has been featured or quoted in a wide variety of local and national publications, including Forbes.com, GlobeSt.com, Marketwatch.com, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, Law.com, Law360.com, The New York Law Journal, and Commerce Magazine. Mr. Wolfe has a track record of obtaining significant assessment reductions on behalf of his clients. Examples of those assessment reductions include: • Reduced hotel assessment from $188 million to $131million; • Reduced multi-family assessment from $116 million to $67 million; • Reduced office assessment from $115.5 million to $90million; • Reduced supermarket anchored center from $66.9 million to $46 million; • Reduced nursing home assessment from $36 million to $10.1million; • Reduced big box retail assessment from $21.3 million to $13.4 million; • Reduced office assessment from $27.8 million to $6.5million. Mr. Wolfe began his career as an associate at the law firm of Davis Polk and Wardwell in New York. While at Davis Polk, he focused his practice on regulatory investigations, securities litigation and banking disputes. Mr. Wolfe is a member of the American Bar Association House of Delegates and is the Co-Chair of the ABA’s Diversity & Inclusion 360 Presidential Commission. As a young lawyer, Mr. Wolfe served as the Chair of the ABA Young Lawyers Division, the ABA’s largest entity with more than 130,000 members. Mr. Wolfe received his J.D. from New York University School of Law, and graduated from Cornell University with distinction in all subjects.

Jose is a senior managing director and co-office head in the New Jersey office of JLL Capital Markets, Americas. He joins JLL as part of the HFF acquisition and is a member of the firm’s leadership committee. Jose specializes in investment advisory throughout New Jersey, New York and Connecticut and also oversees the day-to-day operations of the firm’s New Jersey office. During the course of his more than 25-year commercial real estate career, he’s been involved in more than $62 billion of office, industrial, retail, multifamily and land sales. Jose started at HFF in March 2010. Before that, he was the executive director of Cushman & Wakefield’s New York area investment sales group where he spent more than 17 years. He began his real estate career as a real estate analyst at PaineWebber, UBS, Inc.

James M. Maggio, Jr. is Counsel in Riker Danzig’s Real Estate Practice Group and is highly experienced in commercial real estate and related corporate transactions. His practice encompasses a wide variety of matters. Jim represents clients in complex commercial real estate matters, including joint ventures, primarily handling significant multimillion-dollar transactions. He has helped clients sell and acquire substantial commercial properties and to secure permanent and/or construction financing for the acquisition and/or development of significant office and industrial properties. Jim is also a member of the firm’s Financial Institutions Practice group and in that capacity has represented institutional lenders in complex financing transactions involving real estate. He also advises landlords and tenants in reviewing, negotiating and drafting office and industrial leases along with ancillary documents such as assignments, estoppels and subordination and non-disturbance agreements. In addition, he also regularly advises clients with respect to realty transfer taxes and the structuring of real property holdings.

Jonathan Gertman joined The NRP Group in 2009 as an Assistant Developer and now serves as Senior Vice President of Development for the New York City office. His primary responsibilities include originating and overseeing both market rate and affordable development efforts in New York, , New Jersey, Connecticut, and Massachusetts. During his previous role in the San Antonio office, he was involved with the origination of 900 units of Low-Income Housing Tax Credit projects. Between his two positions at NRP, Gertman worked for Forest City Realty Trust in New York. He was responsible for originating and managing multifamily and mixed-use projects in the greater tri-state area. During his tenure, he worked on the development of 980 units of luxury multifamily housing and ancillary retail. Gertman is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and holds a bachelor’s degree in urban studies with a minor in real estate finance from The Wharton School. He is a member of the board of Neighbors Together, a Brooklyn based food bank. He is also a Trustee of Congregation Beth Elohim of Brooklyn. He lives with his wife in the Park Slope neighborhood of Brooklyn and enjoys walking their adopted schnauzer-terrier, Babka.

After a twelve-year career in Information Technology at large financial and law firms, Anthony began investing in multifamily properties in Newark, NJ in 2014. In a quest for financial freedom, he strategically acquired multiple assets over an 18-month span. After building a seven-figure portfolio in multifamily real estate in Newark, he realized he could not find a quality property manager for his portfolio. With this insight, he started a property management company in 2016 and in 2020 opened a boutique brokerage for investors looking to build their portfolios. Anthony lives in the Ironbound section of Newark with his wife Eliana and three daughters Amelia, Aveline and Ariella. He is an avid fan of the Yankees, 49ers, playing golf and Portuguese cuisine.

Peter Polt is an Executive Vice President at J.G. Petrucci Co., Inc. and is responsible for the company’s acquisition and development activities in New Jersey and Eastern Pennsylvania. Peter possesses over 15 years of turnkey real estate development experience managing over $750MM worth of transactions and investments for a wide array of real estate asset classes. As an Executive Vice President, Peter is responsible for all aspects of the real estate development process including site selection, acquisition and disposition, strategic and financial planning, investment analysis, lease and contract negotiations, land development approvals, construction management, business development, and community relations. Peter has previously worked for CBRE directing the company’s industrial project management platform in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic region. Peter also served as a project manager for Pennoni Associates Inc. in their Geotechnical Engineering Division. Peter received his Bachelor of Science in Geology, with honors, from Hobart College and obtained his MBA in Finance from Lehigh University.

Mark M. Mindick is a longstanding partner and has been a substantial part of the growth of the firm for the past 22 years, consulting on a wide range of value-added tax, consulting, and assurance matters, with a specialized focus in the real estate sector. His clients include the greater real estate and financial services community, both domestic and international. A leader in the firm’s Real Estate Practice, Mark serves as a specialist and go-to consultant for the real estate community, from entrepreneurs all the way through some of the largest national brands in U.S. real estate. He is involved in all verticals of the industry and is highly skilled in mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures, and other various areas of business counsel and analysis. He also negotiates with a wide range of capital sources from private investors, family offices, real estate funds, hedge funds, and other institutional grade investors. On the pulse of the marketplace, Mark brings value to clients with his proactive approach and deep understanding of his clients’ issues and goals, helping to scale and diversify businesses to grow them to the next level. Mark maintains an extensive network of equity sources and has expansive knowledge in structuring deals from every aspect, ranging from all tiers of the capital stack to sophisticated multi-tier joint venture structures. An expert in benchmarking against the marketplace, he also advises on initiating, structuring, and analyzing real estate funds and syndication vehicles. Prior to joining Citrin Cooperman, Mark served at a regional NYC firm focusing on high-level consulting and assurance projects.

Brian Lovett is a Partner and Team Leader of the Tax and Real Estate Services Teams at Withum. Brian has extensive experience serving the tax needs of both public companies and closely held businesses, including all aspects of tax compliance for partnerships and corporations. He advises clients with regard to the structure and tax consequences of new business ventures, and assists with restructuring existing businesses for increased tax efficiency. On the real estate side, Brian has prior Big 4 experience working closely with large, multinational real estate investment companies. He now works closely with real estate entrepreneurs on acquisition planning and entity structuring, property operation and development and wealth transfer/succession planning. Brian is a licensed Certified Public Accountant in the States of New Jersey and Pennsylvania, licensed to practice law in the State of New Jersey, and a frequent speaker on technical tax topics for national webinars and various industry groups.

Eugene R. Diaz is the founder and principal partner at Prism Capital Partners. Prism, began in 2002 with a mission of strategically investing and developing solely in the Tri-State area, across a broad spectrum of asset classes and transaction sizes. Today, the firm employs more than forty (40) professionals providing construction, development, investment, and property management services to its many institutional partners and investors. Through his stewardship, the firm remains one of the state’s most active and respected redevelopers focusing on adaptive re-use and repurposing of excess corporate facilities and turn of the century industrial buildings. The firm actively develops from the ground up for multi-family, office, industrial and retail investments as well, and purchases both stabilized and un- stabilized income producing assets. The firm has exhibited a strong investment discipline and a corresponding track record that attracts joint venture equity capital from some of the most venerable global investment management firms. Prism is leaving an indelible mark on the New Jersey landscape with such notable redevelopments and adaptive reuses project like Parkway Lofts in Bloomfield, NJ, the 361 unit apartment conversion of the former 100 year old GE BoilerWorks Building on the Garden State Parkway, as well as the 333 unit apartment conversion of the 100 year old historically designated Thomas A Edison Battery and Invention Center in West Orange, NJ and the redevelopment of the 116 acre former Roche Pharmaceutical headquarters known as ON 3, which houses the prestigious Hackensack-Meridian Seton Hall College of Medicine. Previously, Diaz worked for Cushman & Wakefield and held several leadership positions at Gale & Wentworth, including chief investment officer responsible for directing and overseeing all aspects of the company's investment activities. During his tenure he grew the firm's owned investment portfolio from 500,000 square feet to more than 12 million square feet in eight states. Throughout his career, Diaz has been responsible for the acquisition and capitalization of more than 20 million square feet of commercial real estate with total transaction value in excess of $2.5 billion.. He is frequently quoted in many industry publications as well as topical pieces in the New York Times and Wall Street Journal. He earned a master's degree in Real Estate Investment & Development from New York University, where he has frequented as a guest lecturer and stand-in professor. Diaz received undergraduate degrees in Economics and Political Science from Northwestern University. Early in his career Diaz was honored by Commercial Property News as one of their "Stars to Watch." and is regularly ranked by NJBIZ as one of New Jersey’s most influential real estate people ranking him 3rd out of the 75 most influential leaders. He is a past member of the Board of Trustees of Englewood Hospital and an Honorary Foundation Board Member of the Bergen Performing

Andrew Natale joined SJP Properties in 2014 and has over fourteen (14) years of construction experience across a variety of project disciplines. Andrew is a graduate of Villanova University with a Bachelor of Science degree in Civil Engineering. Prior to joining SJP Properties, Andrew worked for a large commercial nationwide general contractor and completed a variety of interior fit-out, occupied renovation, expansion/remodel, ground-up construction and site development projects. Throughout his career Andrew has completed projects in multiple market sectors including office & headquarters, retail, government, industrial, hospitality, mixed-use, gaming and food service. His role included regional project management for a national construction account with various renovation, ground-up and expansion/re-model projects throughout the Northeast. Since joining SJP Properties, Andrew has completed over 750,000 SF of tenant interior fit-out including 310,000SF for Valeant Pharmaceuticals. Following completion of Valeant’s construction, he began consulting services as Valeant’s construction manager for construction and development projects nationwide. His work has also included Newell Brands, Nice Systems, Linde North America, Marsh & McLennan Companies, Mazda, Qualcomm, Impax Laboratories, Kering Eyewear, iGate, ExecuSearch, Asurion and various building amenity upgrades throughout SJP’s building portfolio. Andrew’s responsibilities cover the entire project life cycle including conceptual estimating, budgeting, design review, pre-construction, scheduling, permitting, procurement, bidding, contracting, construction management, project controls, quality control, project close-out and turnover.

Jennifer Porter is Practice Group Leader of the firm’s Redevelopment, Land Use & Zoning Group. Her ability to practice zoning and land use development law in four states (New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania and Connecticut) establishes her as a key player in helping clients expand into the regional real estate market. Jennifer represents clients ranging from Fortune 500 companies to developers, owners and lessees of commercial, retail, industrial and residential properties. She represents clients in all aspects of land use, zoning and development law.