After Bob Friedland sold his Harrison-based real estate company to another firm, Sarah Jones-Maturo, at the time a successful commercial broker with global real estate firm CBRE, came on board to lead RM Friedland. “She immediately outshined her predecessors by evaluating the company and hiring the right people for administration,” says associate broker and current colleague Steve Kornspun. “Simultaneously, she hired several brokers, experts in each of their respective fields: industrial, office, retail, and investment real estate.”
Four years into her tenure as president, Jones-Maturo thinks being a good listener is what makes her a good leader. “That is a distinction between female and male leadership styles,” she says. “That’s not to say men aren’t good listeners, but a lot of female leaders have that style.”
As president, she is charged with business development, staff management, and recruiting. “I am working to improve our position in the industry as thought leaders,” Jones-Maturo says. Her experience as a broker (she completed more than one million square feet of transactions in her last two years at CBRE) has helped her spearhead business-development initiatives that led to RM Friedland landing the leasing for phases one and two of the retail component of RXR’s mixed-use development in New Rochelle, and the first phase of retail leasing at Edge-on-Hudson in Sleepy Hollow.
“I love the action,” Jones-Maturo says of the real estate business. “I love that we are on the front lines of the economy in many respects.”
