Real estate magnate Jay Kislak dies at 96

Jay Kislak, chairman of the Kislak Organization real estate company, died Wednesday at his home in Miami. He was 96.Jay Kislak, chairman of the Kislak Organization real estate company, died Wednesday at his home in Miami. He was 96.

Born June 6, 1922 in Hoboken, Kislak earned his first real estate license while in high school and graduated with a degree of economics from the Wharton School of Finance at the University of Pennsylvania, before serving as a naval aviator during World War II.

He moved to Miami in 1953 with his first wife, the late Beverly Braverman, and the couple had three children. In Miami, where the Kislak Organization was headquartered upon relocating from Hoboken, he spent years growing the real estate company, which today has New Jersey offices in Basking Ridge and Woodbridge.

Kislak was an avid collector of books, paintings, manuscripts and other historical artifacts. In 2004, he donated 4,000 of those items to the Library of Congress from the nonprofit Jay I. Kislak Foundation, which he established with his second wife Jean.

He is survived by his three children, a stepdaughter, five grandchildren, six great-grandchildren and his brother.