Laurie Lustig-Bower EVP, CBRE

In September, Laurie Lustig-Bower closed the $400M-plus sale of the Robinsons-May site in Beverly Hills (9900 Wilshire Blvd) to a new owner who plans to develop a mixed-use project. It's the second time she's sold the property, having previously sold it to London brothers Nick and Chris Candy for half a billion dollars in 2007. She credits her father, who owned recording studios, for her drive and work ethic. "I used to sit in my dad's big office in New York and think, one day I'll be running this company." (Alas, when Laurie was 13 or 14, her father sold his company without consulting her first.) After Laurie graduated from the entrepreneurial program at USC, it was her dad who encouraged her to get some "street smart experience" to augment her book smarts, so for a time she sold hospital equipment for Baxter. Having been told by friends and family that she might like real estate, she reached out to one of CBRE's top brokers who was a USC alum for an informational interview; he ended up hiring her for his team. After he left the company, Laurie stayed on at CBRE and took various managers out to lunch to explain how she would accomplish her vision of becoming a preeminent multifamily broker in the Greater LA region. One of them was future CEO Brett White. "I still have the notes that he made on my business plan." Laurie's married to Tim Bower, a retail broker who works in the same office, and they have a 12-year-old daughter, Katherine. A favorite mother-daughter activity, even while on vacation, is to help out at local animal shelters.