American Real Estate Group opens.

A major new player has entered New York's highly competitive residential brokerage field.

Mika Sakamoto, most recently one of The Corcoran Group's top producers and long recognized as one of the city's top power brokers, has opened her own company - the American Real Estate Group.

Headquartered in spacious, elegantly appointed offices at 1370 Avenue of the Americas, the full-service real estate company will specialize in the sale and leasing of condominium cooperative apartments and townhouses throughout Manhattan. It will also offer property management services for absentee owners.

While most New York residential brokerages are local in nature, the American Real Estate Group will be global. Many of its clients are investment buyers from Asia, Europe and South America.

"It's not enough today just to know the local co-op and condominium market inside out," asserted Sakamoto. "You also have to be able to use that knowledge to provide strong real estate investment analysis to investment buyers from Hang Kong, Singapore, Taiwan, Indonesia, Japan, Germany, England, Buenos Aires and dozen of other world markets. That's our strength and that's what's going to separate us from our competitors."

Based on her past accomplishments, few, if any goals appear beyond Sakamoto's capability. During the past six years, for example, no individual broker has sold more units or accounted for greater combined sales volume (over $235 million) at Manhattan's newest upscale residential buildings - Millennium Tower, Trump International Hotel and Tower, Mondrian, 610 Park Avenue and 515 Park Avenue than Sakamoto.

But the American Real Estate Group is hardly a one-person operation. Sakamoto is launching the company with a sales force of more than a dozen experienced residential brokers and a strong senior management team headed by real estate veterans Tom Cauthorn, senior vice president of finance; Hideko Horiguchi, senior vice president; and Terrell Braly, manager of sales.

"We have created a very special, technologically-advanced environment, with unusual local and global resources and support, that's designed to help our sales professionals succeed," said Sakamoto, who added that she plans to eventually open at least five offices to serve the Manhattan marketplace. "We're hopeful many more high-end brokers, eager to reach their potential in a truly supportive marketing environment, will be joining us in the coming months."

A native of Japan, Sakamoto spent a decade as a business development consultant for Mitsubishi Corporation , where she expanded its base of venture capital partners and helped open doors for Japanese goods into the United States. Later, she served as the Director of Asian Markets for Garrick-Aug Worldwide before entering the residential real estate field in the early 1990's as a Director of Investment for Sumitomo Real Estate Sales (NY). She joined the Corcoran Group as a senior vice president in 1995 and emerged as one of its top investment brokers.

At the American Real Estate Group, Sakamoto says she has structured a company "committed to offering every client the highest level of professional service needed to achieve his or her specific real estate objectives."