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Business History

We’ve grown from a single office in San Francisco into one of the largest diversified real estate services companies in the world.

Since its start in 1958, Grubb & Ellis established itself as an innovative, growth-oriented company with a penchant for providing clients best-in-class client service. Throughout the 1960s and 1970s the company focused on better serving its clients by adding businesses, such as property and asset management, real estate development and insurance brokerage services, and opening and acquiring offices in select regional markets.

The company’s 1981 merger with Jacksonville, Florida.-based GMR Properties, sparked an eastward expansion, and resulted in Grubb & Ellis becoming the first commercial real estate services firm to be publicly traded and listed on the New York Stock Exchange. Throughout the 1980s, Grubb & Ellis grew rapidly and established a nationwide presence through the acquisition of well-established real estate firms in the Pacific Northwest, Northeast, Southeast, Midwest and Texas.

The 1990s marked a period of consolidation and streamlining for Grubb & Ellis as the company divested non-core businesses, including its residential business, and focused on its core Transaction Services and Management Services businesses. As part of this strategy, in 1996 the company acquired sole ownership of Axiom Real Estate Management, Inc., its property and facilities management subsidiary that originated in 1992 as an independently operated joint venture with IBM Corp. Axiom was renamed Grubb & Ellis Management Services, Inc.

Today, Grubb & Ellis has one of the largest domestic brokerage sales forces in the industry. With more than 1,800 brokerage professionals in its owned and affiliate offices, the company has the capability to serve its clients real estate needs in virtually every primary market as well as key secondary and tertiary markets throughout the United States.

With growing property and facility management portfolio totaling more than 200 million square feet representing a diverse roster of corporate, institutional, government and private clients, Grubb & Ellis Management Services has grown to become one of the largest management services providers in the real estate industry. Much of this growth can be attributed to the company’s commitment to innovation and best-in-class service, which was exemplified by Grubb & Ellis Management Services being named Vendor of the Year by Microsoft Corporation in 2007, from among 15,000 vendors of all types.

The company’s biggest transformation to date came in December 2007, when Grubb & Ellis merged with NNN Realty Advisors, Inc., one of the most innovative and successful sponsors of real estate investment programs. The merger combined two complementary firms, providing Grubb & Ellis an established investment management business and the financial capacity to continue to be a leader in the commercial real estate services industry.

As a result of the merger, Grubb & Ellis is now a leading sponsor of real estate investment programs that provide individuals and institutions with the opportunity to invest in tax-deferred 1031 tenant-in-common exchanges, public non-traded real estate investment trusts and real estate investment funds. Through its registered broker-dealer, Grubb & Ellis Securities, Inc., Grubb & Ellis utilizes a nationwide network of broker-dealers and financial representatives to offer its investment products to individual and institutional investors.

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