NYC R E Expo16Sept. 30, 2016 - County Executive Robert Astorino told a crowd of real estate professionals in the New York metropolitan area that Westchester is open for business -- and he pitched the ‘burb as an ideal place for them to open their doors.

Why? Because Westchester has access to a talented workforce, is conveniently located and offers a great quality of life: it offers great schools, public parks and open space and accessibility to airports, mass transportation, hospitals and communities throughout New York, New Jersey and Connecticut.

“Big guys like New York Presbyterian, Montefiore and Memorial Sloan Kettering are investing hundreds of millions of dollars into Westchester, which in turn is creating jobs” Astorino said. “We just had a ribbon cutting for The New York Medical College’s Touro College of Dental Medicine. The first Dental College in NYS in over 50 years. This plays into our strength of a highly skilled and educated workforce, where big hospitals and ,medical education institutions and companies see Westchester as a resource for intelligent and highly-skilled professionals.”

The county executive made his pitch at the 8th Annual NYC Real Estate Expo at the Hilton Hotel in midtown Manhattan where there were more than 4,500 attendees and 200 exhibitors. Astorino was featured in a one-on-one breakout session, a conversation with Michael Stoler, host of the Stoler Report-New York's Business Report, where he discussed how government can help business and spur development. He cited the county’s Industrial Development Agency , which since 2010 has helped companies gain access to capital and tax exempt bonds while saving on sales taxes for new construction and equipment. The IDA has supported projects accounting for over $1.6 billion in private sector investment which has created or retained over 18,000 new, permanent or construction jobs.

During the conversation Astorino spoke of Westchester as an emerging real estate trend unto itself, particularly with hundreds of millions in new developments by national investors and companies -- including transit-oriented projects throughout the county’s major cities and urban centers designed to attract millennials and empty nesters and the continued growth of exciting new biotechnology hubs -- and repurposing corporate parks to reflect new demands in the marketplace.

The real estate expo, sponsored by NYC Network Group, covered a myriad of topics in the industry such as investing in real estate, innovation trends and new technology.