Darcy Stacom, Wendy Silverstein launch real estate advisory firm

Commercial real estate heavyweights Darcy Stacom and Wendy Silverstein first struck up a friendship at the Midtown power lunch spot Patroon. Stacom was a top CBRE investment sales broker and wanted to meet Silverstein, then a Vornado executive.

“I asked her to have lunch,” Stacom said. “I’d always heard about her and occasionally saw her in a meeting but not really dealt with her much, and we established a great friendship from that.”

More than a decade and several fleeting attempts at retirement later, they are joining forces to create a new real estate advisory firm, StacomSilverstein. The Midtown-based boutique firm will handle a variety of transactions, including acquisitions, dispositions, debt and restructuring. The sexagenerian duo is looking to take on complex deals for a few select clients.   

“We’re not looking to do bread and butter,” Stacom said. “And, as we all know, something small that’s complicated can be just as much work and just as hard as something big, so we prefer them to be big.”

The industry veterans spent four decades with their noses to the grindstone, working their way to the top in a field dominated by men. Stacom left CBRE last February after 22 years at the brokerage and launched her own firm, StacomCRE, which will be folded into StacomSilverstein.

In 2015, Silverstein stepped down from her position as co-head of acquisitions and capital markets at Vornado after more than 15 years with the company. She went on to liquidate New York REIT’s 4.4 million square feet of commercial assets and spent a tumultuous year co-leading WeWork’s real estate investment fund before the co-working giant ditched its IPO.

The pair have already worked together on the $3.5 billion recapitalization of the Trinity Church portfolio and the New York REIT liquidation. Last year, they teamed up to represent Rexmark in negotiations with Amtrak over its takeover of Washington Union Station.

“It’s a combination of our wealth of experience and our great fondness and respect for each other that we think is gonna make this fun for us,” Silverstein said.

Both women stepped away from big jobs with thoughts of retirement. But they kept getting pulled back in by clients calling with interesting deals. 

“Last year, as I set up the company, there was time that I had to think about, ‘Could I be retired?’” Stacom said. “Do I love to garden? Sure, I do. But it’s not something I can do 12 months a year.”