As prices for Manhattan office towers and Brooklyn brownstones skyrocket, so do the paychecks of New York's real estate chief executives. The concept of New York real estate filling the pockets of executives is nothing new, but the numbers from this year's Fortune 100 list of the highest paid CEOs are noticeably stronger than recent years. Take Blackstone Group CEO Steve Schwarzman (pictured), who pulled in $690M last year, including salary and his portion of profits generated by the firm's investment funds. And this year could see more money than real estate has seen since 2006 and 2007. At the top of the list is David Hamamoto, former co-head of the real estate principal investment division at Goldman Sachs, who runs investment firm NorthStar Realty Finance Corp, according to Crain's. He made more than $60M running that company, and was paid another $14M by a firm he spun off to shareholders last year. Albert Behler, CEO of Paramount Group, earned $50M last year, thanks to shares granted to top executives as part of the company's IPO. And MBIA CEO Jay Brown rounds out the group with an equity package valued at $36M after he came out of retirement to resuscitate the floundering company. [Crain's]