Howard Lorber, the chief executive of Douglas Elliman Real Estate, has stepped down, the company said on Tuesday.
In a brief announcement, the company said Mr. Lorber, 76, had decided to retire. His departure is effective immediately.
The sudden exit rippled through the real estate industry, with executives attributing it to mounting criticism of Mr. Lorber’s leadership in steering the brokerage’s finances and his failure to adequately address sexual assault allegations against agents in the company.
Since 2021, Douglas Elliman’s total market value has plummeted from more than $900 million to around $130 million.
In July, amid those losses and the allegations of sexual misconduct, one shareholder circulated a letter demanding that Mr. Lorber reduce his compensation. “Stockholders deserve to know how the assault and harassment claims were handled by management,” the shareholder, Brad Tirpak, wrote. He also called on the board to begin looking for a replacement.
Mr. Lorber had been chairman of the New York-based company since 2003, and in the two decades since, had helped it grow into one of the country’s largest residential real estate brokerages.
Earlier this year, The Real Deal, a real estate trade publication, was the first to report that two former star Elliman agents, the brothers Tal and Oren Alexander, were facing lawsuits from two women who accused them of sexual assault. More reports followed, including in The New York Times, and other women filed additional suits.
Nine more women came forward in The Times’s investigation. Five additional real estate professionals told The Times that they either had personally told executives about assaults or had been told about them by company executives, but that the brokerage had continued to support the brothers.
One of the women who came forward said she had told Mr. Lorber that she believed she might have been drugged by Oren Alexander in 2010 after attending a birthday party in Manhattan.
That woman, Jessica Cohen, is an award-winning broker for Douglas Elliman. She told The Times that after having a drink with Oren, Tal and Oren’s twin brother, Alon Alexander, she blacked out for several hours and woke up in a hospital. She shared her concerns with Mr. Lorber two years later, she said.
Another agent, the “Million Dollar Listing Los Angeles” star Tracy Tutor, told The Times that she had shared a drink with Oren Alexander at a cocktail party in 2014 and then blacked out. A fellow broker found her in the bathroom with Oren and pulled her away, and told The Times that he later alerted another top Elliman executive of the incident.
Responding to those allegations in a statement to The Times, Stephen Larkin, a spokesman for Douglas Elliman, said an incident had been raised casually and confidentially to Mr. Lorber without specifying who might have been involved, rather than in the form of an official complaint to human resources.
“Had any such complaints been received, those complaints would have been thoroughly investigated,” he said. The statement did not address a second allegation raised by The Times.
Mr. Lorber’s contract was set to expire on Dec. 29. Michael Liebowitz, a member of the board, will be his successor, the brokerage said.
Mr. Lorber did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
In a statement, Douglas Elliman wrote, “Douglas Elliman extends its deepest appreciation to Mr. Lorber for his strategic vision and years of dedication and hard work that have made Douglas Elliman the country’s premier real estate brokerage firm, setting new standards in luxury service and innovation.”
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