Industry leader Joseph Gabbaian joins Avison Young in Los Angeles

Office investment sales and leasing specialist joins as Principal

LOS ANGELES, Feb. 23, 2012 /PRNewswire/ - Neil Resnick, Avison Young Principal and Managing Director of the company's West Los Angeles office, announced today that commercial real estate broker Joseph Gabbaian has joined Avison Young's brokerage operations in Los Angeles.

Effective immediately, Gabbaian joins Avison Young as a Principal. Based in the company's West Los Angeles office, he will continue to focus on commercial investment sales and lease transactions while also helping to further Avison Young's expansion in Los Angeles and Southern California. He was most recently Senior Vice-President with Grubb & Ellis Company in Los Angeles.

"We are thrilled to have Joseph Gabbaian join the West Los Angeles office of Avison Young. His name is synonymous with the Santa Monica and West Los Angeles commercial real estate markets," comments Resnick. "Bringing Joseph on board is further testimony to our commitment to client service through expertise, and our commitment to growing our presence in Los Angeles. Joseph is widely considered as one of the top investment and leasing brokers in the West Los Angeles market."

Gabbaian brings to Avison Young three decades of commercial real estate experience, including 23 years at Grubb & Ellis where he was consistently one of the firm's top producers in the West Los Angeles office. In 2011, he ranked as the firm's # 1 broker for all of Metropolitan Los Angeles.

Prior to joining Grubb & Ellis, Gabbaian owned and operated his own firm Gabbaian and Company (1985 to 1988), after spending the first six years of his real estate career with Moore Commercial (1978 to 1984), both in Denver, Colorado.

Gabbaian has acted on behalf of such major clients as Prudential Insurance, Archstone, Dordan Properties, JSM Construction, PMI Financial and Safco Capital. He holds a Master of Business Administration degree in real estate and construction management from the University of Denver, a Master of Engineering degree from McGill University in Montreal, and a Bachelor of Science degree in electrical engineering from Arya Mehr University in Iran.

"I have great respect for the top management at Avison Young, which is dedicated and committed to growing the firm to become a force in the market," says Gabbaian. "I also know and respect other Avison Young brokers and staff members in Los Angeles and elsewhere in the U.S., and I am convinced that, together, we will make this company the envy of the industry."

Avison Young opened its West Los Angeles office in August 2011, followed by a second Los Angeles office in December through the acquisition of Ramsey-Shilling Commercial Real Estate Services, Inc. Avison Young expects to open a number of offices throughout Southern California in order to effectively cover the entire market, and views the West Coast as critical to the ongoing growth of the company's U.S. footprint.

Over the past three years, Avison Young has grown from 11 to 26 offices and from 300 to more than 800 real estate professionals across Canada and the U.S.

Earlier this week, the company was named a winner of Canada's 50 Best Managed Companies program for 2011, sponsored by Deloitte, CIBC, National Post and Queen's School of Business.

Founded in 1978, Avison Young is Canada's largest independently-owned commercial real estate services company. Headquartered in Toronto, Ontario, Avison Young is also the largest Canadian-owned, principal-managed commercial real estate brokerage firm in North America. Comprising more than 800 real estate professionals in 26 offices across Canada and the U.S., the full-service commercial real estate company provides value-added, client-centric investment sales, leasing, advisory, management, financing and mortgage placement services to owners and occupiers of office, retail, industrial and multi-residential properties.

• Editors/Reporters: please click on link to view and download photo of Joseph Gabbaian
http://www.avisonyoung.com/sites/default/files/content-files/Media_Room/Temp/Joseph_Gabbaian.jpg

SOURCE Avison Young (Canada) Inc.