Newmark Buying RKF To Form New Retail Brokerage, Newmark RKF

Newmark Group is buying retail brokerage RKF in a deal that is expected to close by the end of the year.

RKF founder Robert Futterman will stay on as chairman of what will be known as Newmark RKF and will oversee the company’s retail expansion, according to Newmark. The price of the deal, which was long rumored, was undisclosed.

Newmark has been aggressively expanding since it went public late last year. It hired Cantor Commercial Real Estate founder Anthony Orso to head up its capital markets strategies group in March and poached an Eastdil Secured team to run the hotel capital markets group earlier this month.

Newmark CEO Barry Gosin said the acquisition of RKF was part of the company goal to score top talent, as well as fitting into a plan to build a retail leasing and investment sales platform.

“Robert Futterman has attracted some of the best talent in the industry, and combined with Newmark's growing retail business, we aim to create the top ranked retail company nationally,” Gosin said in a statement. 

Futterman, who founded the firm in 1998, said he is “thrilled” to be expanding RKF’s national brand. Representatives for RKF and Newmark were not immediately available for comment.

Rumors of RKF's pending sale to Newmark have been circulating, The Real Deal reported earlier this year. Colliers International and CBRE also reportedly considered buying the Manhattan-based brokerage in 2015 and 2014, but those deals did not come to fruition. At the time of those deals, industry players said the firm could be worth between $40M and $80M.