PHOENIX-People are moving up the ranks at CRE firms throughout the region, with the latest promotions taking place at Lee & Associates and CBRE. At the latter firm, Afton Trail has been named managing director of institutional services, while Andi St. John was recently promoted to senior director of asset services. Meanwhile, at Lee & Associates, Matt Fredrick and Colton Trauter have been promoted to principals.

At CBRE, Trail will head up a department focusing on agency leasing, asset services, project management, capital markets and valuation.  Afton has led the company's asset services group since 1999 and has extensive experience in third-party real estate management. St. John, in the meantime, has worked in the asset services group for more than 17 years, where she supervised and directed a team of property managers responsible for the management of more than 13 million square feet of commercial real estate. In her new role, she'll be responsible for the day-to-day supervision of CBRE's office, retail and industrial management portfolio throughout Phoenix.

“The selection of these two best-in-class professionals will help us continue to raise the bar for customer service and enable CBRE to build upon its industry leading position in the Phoenix marketplace,” comments CBRE's senior managing director and Arizona market leader Craig Henig in a press release.

At Lee & Associates, Fredrick and Trauter were promoted due to very positive results in 2012. According to Fred Darche, the company's principal, both brokers' hard work and transaction success led to the promotion. “Both brokers joined us after college and took advantage of the experience and training at Lee & Associates,” says Darche in a press release.

Matt Fredrick graduated from Arizona State University and specializes in landlord and tenant representation for leasing and sale of industrial properties. Fredrick has completed more than 400 transactions totaling more than 3 million square feet.

Colton Trauter is also an ASU graduate, where he received his degree from the WP Carey School of Business. Trauter specializes in representing landlords and tenants in the leasing and sale of commercial office properties. He has completed 300 transactions totaling 4 million square feet.