California dreamer is on cloud nine in the big 'A'.

As a typical alpha male, Mitch LaBar starts his day at 5:00 in the morning, driving into the city from Mahwah, N.J. and spending an hour at the gym before heading off to the office. Fortunately, after moving to the East Coast from his native Southern California five years ago, LaBar finds that he fits right into the fast-paced New York lifestyle.

"On the West Coast, I was considered kind of an obnoxious, aggressive person," he jokes. "Here, I am just considered normal."

LaBar's energy and drive to succeed were the qualities that led him to a senior position at Marcus & Millichap in the first place.

After getting his undergraduate degree in economics from Brigham Young University, he wanted to get a year of actual business experience before starting work on his M.B.A. So he joined the Marcus & Millichap Newport Beach, Ca. office as a sales associate and tried selling apartment buildings. The business turned out to be so profitable, LaBar was reluctant to give up his newfound profession.

"As a real estate agent, speaking candidly, the income that I was earning was more than I ever dreamed of making in another field and that kept me [going]. That one year turned into 20 years," he explains. "And then I started investing on my own, fell in love with the real estate industry and something kind of unique happened: when I went into management, I found out that I loved teaching and training and managing brokers. Fortunately, I've been able to work with some of the best brokers in the market, so it brought me intense enjoyment."

After rising through the ranks of M&M for 15 years--he eventually became one of the nine partners in the company and division manager for several offices in Southern California--LaBar was offered a chance to move to the Northeast and open the firm's first Manhattan office, as well as offices in Philadelphia, New Jersey and Connecticut. Although he loves his new home, he admits that the way of doing business is very different in New York than it is in Encino.

"In California, we would create and negotiate and put together all of the purchase and sell contracts ourselves, even if it was a $25 million deal," he says. "In New York, we have an attorney involved even if it's a $25,000 thing. There is a definite difference in terms of business."

He no longer completes his own deals, but LaBar insists that he is very hands-on when it comes to his employees. In addition to being in charge of training for all new brokers, he helps them with their transactions and oversees operations for the Northeast region as a whole.

"I get involved so much with the agents that I don't really miss the transaction part of the business. I get to do more of it actually," he says. "I am in offices all over the country on a regular basis."

Currently, LaBar is reviewing plans for M&M's further expansion in the region. In a few years, the firm would like to have an office in every borough of the city, as well as hiring more agents for its Manhattan base.

"We are going to double our New York office and we are also thinking about opening up in Brooklyn," LaBar says. "In Southern California, we have seven offices, in the New York area, we will probably have at least five."

M&M will be hiring in the next few months, and when asked what kind of brokers the company is looking for, LaBar mentions strong sales skills and high energy--apparently, working with other overachievers is not a problem for him.

"We have 45 people right now, in the new office we'll have 85," he says. "Most of the people that we hire have very, very good sales skills--they have either been brokers on Wall Street or they've been selling pharmaceuticals or some high-tech items. We [also] have what we call an SAP program--we bring about 75 people a year on board for 18 months, and they assist us and learn the business prior to us making a decision to [hire] them or not."

One would think that between training all these new people, managing the company's Northeast operations and serving as a member of REBNY's board of directors, even the most ambitious man would feel like he has enough to occupy his time. But LaBar is definitely a type A personality, so he spends his off-hours raising five teenage kids.

"My family is very happy here," he attests. "I've got five kids, a girl who is a freshman in college and four boys, who are from 11 to 17. They love it here."