The Corcoran Group threw their annual awards ceremony at the Hammerstein Ballroom in Manhattan on February 1. Joan Rivers entertained the crowd with her stand-up routine while real estate agents from the Manhattan, Brooklyn and the East End offices mingled and munched on the offerings from a lavish buffet.

The top sales associates, those with the highest gross commission income, from each of the East End offices were given a crystal award with their name etched on the surface.

The top award, East End Salesperson of the Year, went to Susan Breitenbach in the Bridgehampton office. Having summered on the East End for most of her life, Ms. Breitenbach took the plunge and moved here from Manhattan 25 years ago. She took the business acumen she acquired from Wall Street, her intimate knowledge of the East End, and set them to work in the real estate business. Before joining the Corcoran Group, Ms. Breitenbach worked for Allan Schneider and has handled over $1 billion in real estate transactions over the years.

The “Rookie of the Year” award was given to Meg Salem from the East Hampton office, a newly licensed and new to the company agent with the highest gross commission income. A California native with 17 years of business development experience and marketing executive skills, Ms. Salem moved to the East End more than a decade ago. The combination of her business background and her expertise renovating and designing homes has helped her succeed in real estate.
In addition, awards for Salesperson of the Year were given to:

Deirdre Jowers of the Amagansett office. Ms. Jowers, a Corcoran Group vice president, joined the company when it took over Allan Schneider Associates, where she’d been a broker for several years. A former model and mother of three, Ms. Jowers said she got involved in real estate after several of her own successful investments in the market. Gene Stilwell in the Bridgehampton office. After spending his early years in the Manhattan theater world, Mr. Stilwell found his calling in real estate when he was 30 years old. He moved to the East End in the 1990s and recently began partnering with Corcoran Associate broker Evan Kulman, a residential specialist and investor/builder.

Diane Saatchi of the East Hampton office. After years in the mental health field, Ms. Saatchi changed careers in 1987 when she and her husband moved to East Hampton. She worked for ET Dayton and in 1994 for the Halstead Property Company, which she helped transform from a three-person office into three-offices with 60 brokers and over $133 million in sales before joining the Corcoran operation.

Gary DePersia of the East Hampton office. Mr. DePersia was with Allan Schneider for 10 years before he came on board at Corcoran Group. With a record of closing on more than 100 of his own personal listings, Mr. DePersia has consistently ranked among the top East End agents. He is also a skier and windsurfer in his free time.

Joan Hegner from the Montauk Office. After falling in love with Montauk more than 30 years ago, Ms. Hegner worked for Craft Real Estate in Montauk and then later started Sea & Sun Realty with her husband. The company merged with Allan Schneider Associates in 2005, which was taken over by Corcoran last year.

Patricia Gleason of the North Fork office. Originally from the Catskills, N.Y., and with a background in nursing and the medical profession, Ms. Gleason made the jump and moved to the North Fork in 2001. The change prompted a career switch and Ms. Gleason ventured into the real estate world, where she became one of Allan Schneider’s top producer on the North Fork within only a few years.

Jane Holden of the Sag Harbor office. Ms. Holden is a lifelong Sag Harbor resident with a wealth of information about the community. She’s been a top-producing broker in the area and is known for offering potential buyers, sellers and renters an education in the marketplace, pricing trends and inventory availability and all other information relevant to making a real estate decision.

Cee Scott Brown from Sag Harbor. A top real estate agent since he moved here in the 1990s, Mr. Brown originally started out in the art world, working at the The Museum of Modern Art, being director of the Holly Solomon Gallery and working for the Art Matters Foundation. He became a top broker at Allan Schneider Associates not long after he started working for them.

Penelope Moore of the Shelter Island office. Ms. Moore, a Washington D.C. native, discovered Shelter Island in the mid 1990s and wasted no time buying a house there. After moving there fulltime in 2001, she began selling real estate on the island, eventually handling two of the highest sales ever recorded. Connie Walsh from the Westhampton and Hampton Bays offices. Having settled in Quogue in the late 1990s, Ms. Walsh has focused her energy on those real estate markets. Originally a broker in the Manhattan office, she is a member of Corcoran’s $25-million-dollar club and has been involved in many community activities and organizations on the East End, including the Parrish Art Museum and environmental preservation efforts on the North and South Forks.

David Butland of the Southampton office. Mr. Butland has sold everything from bungalows to multimillion-dollar houses during his 13 years selling real estate on the East End. He is known for his knowledge of property values, real estate trends, zoning and environmental issues, and the attributes and amenities of each hamlet.

Geoffrey Hull from the Southampton office. A consummate insider—having been born and raised on the East End—Mr. Hull has been working in the Hamptons real estate business for the last 15 years. After graduating from college and before returning to his birthplace, he worked on Wall Street and lived briefly in Aspen, Colorado. He is the 5th generation of his family to live in Southampton.

With the exception of Ms. Salem and Ms. Jowers, all awards winners were senior vice presidents. Ms. Jowers is a vice president.