Grubb Ellis Co. (GRBE), a U.S. real
estate services company, agreed to sell almost all its assets to
BGC Partners Inc. (BGCP) and filed for bankruptcy protection.
Grubb Ellis listed assets of as much as $500 million and
liabilities of up to the same amount in the Chapter 11 filing in
U.S. Bankruptcy Court in New York yesterday. The company said it
completed about 12,000 sale and lease transactions last year and
manages more than 250 million square feet of property.
“We determined that a partnership with BGC provides the
best platform for our brokerage professionals, employees and
clients,” Thomas P. D’Arcy, chief executive officer of Grubb
Ellis, said in a statement yesterday. “We expect no disruption
to the company’s operations.”
The Santa Ana, California-based company blamed the downturn
in the U.S. real estate market between 2007 and 2009 for losses
during the period that it said severely strained its liquidity
and hampered its ability to keep operating, according to a court
filing. Grubb Ellis failed to find a buyer outside the
bankruptcy process, Chief Financial Officer Michael Rispoli said
in the filing.
BGC Partners, a New York-based broker of financial
products, agreed to provide a loan of as much as $4.8 million to
Grubb Ellis to keep it operating during the bankruptcy
process, Rispoli said.
The case is: In re: Grubb Ellis File No. 12-10685. U.S.
Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York (New
York).
To contact the reporter on this story:
Joe Schneider at jschneider5@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story:
Douglas Wong at dwong19@bloomberg.net
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