Overview

Gender

male

Investor Type

Angel

Investor Stage

Seed

Richard LeFrak has been among the top executives of his family’'s LeFrak Organization since 1975, the year he became the real estate concern’'s president. He has been CEO and chairman since 2003, the year his father, Samuel LeFrak, died. He joined the company in 1968, shortly after graduating from Columbia Law School. The LeFrak Organization is one of the New York City region'’s most prominent real estate ownership and management groups. Its holdings include more than 40 million square feet of residential, commercial and retail holdings nationwide. Locally, these include the office tower at 40 West 57th Street (LeFrak controls seven office towers in Midtown), the massive 20-building LeFrak City in Queens and the Gateway apartment complex in downtown Manhattan. Richard LeFrak has greatly expanded the firm’'s holdings. The Newport development in Jersey City, begun in 1986, for instance, added eight office buildings, 13 apartment towers, a mall and two hotels to LeFrak'’s portfolio. Richard LeFrak also commenced a major development push in South Florida and has diversified the firm's’ holdings into gas and oil investment. LeFrak was born in 1945 in New York City and graduated from Amherst College before going on to Columbia. His wife, Karen Tucker, is a children'’s author; they have two sons, Harrison and James, both of whom work at the family firm.