125 Greenwich Street, Madison Square Park Tower, 1 Seaport and Howard Lorber (Credit: Douglas Elliman and Getty Images)
Douglas Elliman chief Howard Lorber earned $10.6 million last year — a modest drop following a year in which the residential brokerage struggled with profitability.
Lorber’s haul included a base salary of $3.198 million, plus a $3.157 million bonus. His total compensation dropped $425,000 from 2016, when he pocketed $11.059 million, according to a proxy statement filed Monday by Elliman’s parent company, Vector Group.
The Elliman chairman is among real estate’s highest-paid executives. General Growth Property’s Sandeep Mathrani took home $12.2 million in 2016 and Vornado Realty Trust’s Steven Roth pocketed $11.151 million that year, according to the most recent filings for those companies.
Lorber’s payday for both 2016 and 2017 fell well short of the $42.54 million he banked in 2015 — though the majority of that compensation was in the form of stock awards that vest gradually over time.
As of Jan. 1, Lorber’s base pay was bumped up to $3.25 million.
Like prior years, his perks in 2017 included a company car and driver; $7,500-per-month stipend for lodging and business expenses; two club memberships and use of the company plane.
The filing also disclosed that Lorber’s son, Michael Lorber, an agent at Douglas Elliman, made $786,754 as a broker in 2017.
Howard Lorber is Vector’s fifth-largest shareholder with 7.6 million shares — or 5.6 percent — of the company’s stock, according to the proxy statement. Shares closed at $21.18 on Monday.
Elliman sold $26.1 billion worth of real estate last year, up 6.1 percent from 2016. But it was a tough year for the firm — and other residential brokerages — because of a slowdown in new development closings. For the full year, the company’s revenue rose 7 percent to $722.3 million. Net income rose 1.4 percent to $21.4 million.
“I would not say it was a stellar year,” Lorber said during Vector’s March 1 earnings call, during which he attributed the higher sales volume to Elliman’s acquisitions of Los Angeles-based Teles and Boston-based condo specialists Otis & Ahearn.
He also highlighted the impending sale of 701 Seventh Avenue, where Vector’s New Valley subsidiary is a part owner with Steve Witkoff, Ian Schrager, Winthrop Realty Trust, along with Maefield Development and Fortress Investment Group. In February, Maefield and Fortress signed a contract to buy out their other partners in a deal that values the property at $1.53 billion.
“That will show good returns,” Lorber said on the call. “We’ll probably slow down on the new investments, but we have a lot of product that should get monetized this year and in the next year.”
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