CoStar’s People of Note (Oct. 13) – ML Realty Makes C-Suite Appointments, Sack Elevates CFO to President…

ML Realty Partners’ board of directors has named Ryan Hesch president and CEO, and appointed Nancy Kozinski to COO.

Hesch joined ML Realty Partners in 2003 and most recently served as a senior vice president. He succeeds recent retiree and ML Realty Partners founder Mike Luecht, who will remain on the firm’s board of directors along with Hesch. Kozinski will oversee the day-to-day operations of the company, which manages more than $1 billion in assets, and will also serve on the firm’s board of directors.

Sack Properties has promoted Jeff Smith to president. He served as Sack’s CFO and controller since joining the firm in 2001.

In his new role, Smith will take on a leadership position in the growth of the company as it expands its multifamily portfolio in the region. Prior to joining Sack, Smith worked for Ernst & Young, where he was responsible for on-site management of all phases of the audit process. Before that he worked for The Walt Disney Co., the Los Angeles Dodgers and North American Honda Corp.

Avison Young has recruited three commercial real estate finance specialists from JLL to the firm’s capital markets group in Washington, D.C. as principals.

Wesley Boatwright, Jonathan Goldstein and Michael Yavinsky previously served as managing directors within JLL’s capital markets group before transitioning to Avison Young to focus on mortgage brokerage, project-level equity raises and recapitalizations across all asset types. Collectively, the trio brings more than 60 years of experience to Avison Young. Since 2012, the team has negotiated more than $6 billion in transactions.

Matthew Laraway, executive vice president and partner of Baltimore-based Chesapeake Real Estate Group, has been elected president of the Maryland/District of Columbia/Northern Virginia Chapter of the Society of Industrial and Office Realtors (SIOR).

The SIOR designation is a professional accomplishment for highly-qualified commercial real estate experts with a strong and sustained transactional history in brokerage, fee-based services, or executive management.

Robert Hooks, formerly with Lincoln Property Company, has joined Cushman & Wakefields downtown Los Angeles office. Hooks focuses on investment sales of class A properties, agency leasing and tenant representation across the region.

Hooks has nearly 10 years of commercial real estate experience, specializing in leasing and development of creative office space. He most recently served as a vice president with Lincoln Property Co. in Los Angeles. He graduated from the University of Southern California.

Phillips Edison & Co. promoted Gregory Hausfeld to regional vice president of portfolio management in the company’s southeast region, a role that will have him oversee more than eight million square feet across 85 properties in the Southeast U.S.

Hausfeld joined the company in 2010 as a financial analyst. He earned promotions in 2011 and 2012 to underwriting analyst and director of acquisitions, respectively, before joining the portfolio management team in 2015 as a regional director.

Transwestern hired Matthew Kraus as its new regional strategic manager. Working out of the firm’s Atlanta office, Kraus will implement company growth objectives in the Southeast while expanding the company’s business service lines.

Kraus spent the last four years with Duff & Phelps as a senior associate, where he specialized in commercial real estate valuation. Before that he was a landlord rep with H&R Retail in Baltimore.

John Parsons has been promoted to first vice president with CBRE’s valuation and advisory services (VAS) team in Seattle.

Parsons has more than 15 years of commercial real estate experience, including the past five years as a ‘VAS Top Producer’ while expanding CBREs data center business line by acquiring new clients and maintaining client care for existing major accounts. He is a certified general real estate appraiser, an associate member of the Australian Property Institute and a candidate for Appraisal Institute designation.

Avison Young has hired Eric Swanson as senior vice president in the firm’s Ft. Lauderdale, FL office, tasked with leading the firm’s new development advisory services group in Florida.

Swanson brings nearly 40 years of commercial real estate experience, most recently as a partner at Treadwell Franklin Infrastructure Capital LLC. Before that he held leadership positions at real estate investment firm Odebrecht USA and with Flagler Development. Throughout his career, Swanson has worked on such projects as the Beacon Center in Doral, Beacon Pointe in Weston and the IBM expansion in Boca Raton.

Sierra Pacific Mortgage has hired Jay Promisco to serve as its senior vice president of retail lending. Based in the firm’s Folsom, CA headquarters, Promisco will lead the business development, market expansion and strategic direction for the company while overseeing more than 100 retail branches.

Promisco joins Sierra Pacific Mortgage from Stearns Lending, where he served as executive vice president of joint ventures. He brings 17 years of experience to the firm.

Next Realty Mid-Atlantic expanded its practice with the addition of Scott Thiell as senior vice president.

An experienced retail broker in the greater Washington, D.C. metropolitan area, Thiell is a 25-year industry veteran and former co-founder and managing partner of Madison Retail Group. He would later help launch First Retail Partners as a principal before the company’s merger with Colliers International, where he served as a managing director with its retail services division.

Commercial and residential real estate law firm Romer Debbas LLP has hired attorney Christian Daglieri as a partner in the firm’s New York headquarters. In his new role, Daglieri will focus on the agency transaction side as well as advising on acquisitions, development, financing, leasing and development of commercial real estate.

Daglieri has experience advising clients on both sides of the transaction table, representing lenders and borrowers in the New York City area and nationally on more than $1 billion in loan transactions throughout his career. Before accepting the role at Romer Debbas, Daglieri was a partner at Montgomery McCracken Walker & Rhoads LLPs New York office.