Equity Residential is a publicly traded

real estate investment trust A real estate investment trust (REIT) is a company that owns, and in most cases operates, income-producing real estate. REITs own many types of commercial real estate, including office and apartment buildings, warehouses, hospitals, shopping cente ...

that invests in apartments. As of December 31, 2021, the company owned or had investments in 310 properties consisting of 80,407 apartment units in

Southern California Southern California (commonly shortened to SoCal) is a geographic and cultural region that generally comprises the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. It includes the Los Angeles metropolitan area, the second most populous urban a ...

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17th ...

Washington, D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

Seattle Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest regio ...

Denver Denver () is a consolidated city and county, the capital, and most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. Its population was 715,522 at the 2020 census, a 19.22% increase since 2010. It is the 19th-most populous city in the Unit ...

Atlanta Atlanta ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Georgia. It is the seat of Fulton County, the most populous county in Georgia, but its territory falls in both Fulton and DeKalb counties. With a population of 498,715 ...

Dallas Dallas () is the List of municipalities in Texas, third largest city in Texas and the largest city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the List of metropolitan statistical areas, fourth-largest metropolitan area in the United States at 7.5 ...

/ Ft. Worth, and Austin. It is the 5th largest owner of apartments in the United States and the 14th largest apartment property manager in the United States.

History

The company had its origins in Equity Finance and Management Company, founded in 1969 by real-estate investor

Sam Zell Samuel Zell (born Shmuel Zielonka, September 28, 1941) is an American billionaire businessman and philanthropist. A former lawyer, Zell is the founder and chairman of Equity Group Investments, a private investment firm, founded in 1968. He ha ...

. In 1993, the company acquired a large portfolio of properties from

Barry Sternlicht Barry Stuart Sternlicht (born November 27, 1960) is an American billionaire and the co-founder (with Bob Faith), chairman, and CEO of Starwood Capital Group, an investment fund with over $60 billion in assets under management. He is also chairma ...

in exchange for a 20% stake in the company. Sternlicht had acquired the properties via government auctions after the savings and loan crisis. On August 11, 1993, the company became a

public company A public company is a company whose ownership is organized via shares of stock which are intended to be freely traded on a stock exchange or in over-the-counter markets. A public (publicly traded) company can be listed on a stock exchange ( ...

via an

initial public offering An initial public offering (IPO) or stock launch is a public offering in which shares of a company are sold to institutional investors and usually also to retail (individual) investors. An IPO is typically underwritten by one or more investme ...

. At that time, the company owned 22,000 apartments. In 1997, the company acquired Wellsford Residential Property Trust for $620 million in stock and the assumption of $346 million of debt and acquired Evans Withycombe Residential for $625 million in stock and the assumption of $432 million in debt. In 1998, the company acquired a portfolio of 5,774 apartments from Lincoln Property Company for $465 million and acquired Merry Land, which owned 34,990 units in the southeast United States, for $1.17 billion in stock as well as $656 million in debt and $270 million in preferred stock. In 1999, the company acquired Lexford Residential Trust for $203 million in stock and the assumption of $530 million of debt. Lexford owned mainly one-story

affordable housing Affordable housing is housing which is deemed affordable to those with a household income at or below the median as rated by the national government or a local government by a recognized housing affordability index. Most of the literature on af ...

units, rented to households with incomes between $25,000 and $35,000. In 2001, the company was added to the

S&P 500 The Standard and Poor's 500, or simply the S&P 500, is a stock market index tracking the stock performance of 500 large companies listed on stock exchanges in the United States. It is one of the most commonly followed equity indices. As of ...

. In January 2003, CEO Douglas Crocker retired. During his tenure, the company increased its ownership from 22,000 apartments to 227,000 apartments. In 2006, the company sold its Lexford affordable housing division, which included 27,115 apartment units, for $1.09 billion. On February 27, 2013, Equity Residential and AvalonBay Communities closed a $9 billion deal to acquire Archstone from

Lehman Brothers Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. ( ) was an American global financial services firm founded in 1847. Before filing for bankruptcy in 2008, Lehman was the fourth-largest investment bank in the United States (behind Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, a ...

. In 2013, the company sold 8,010 apartment units to a joint venture of Goldman Sachs and Greystar Real Estate Partners for $1.5 billion. In 2016, the company sold 23,262 apartments to Starwood Capital Group for $5.365 billion.

Legal issues

Equity Residential was sued in a class action in 2017 due to allegations that it charged late payment fees in violation of California law. In 2022, the company agreed to pay approximately $2 million to settle a lawsuit filed by

Attorney General for the District of Columbia The Attorney General for the District of Columbia is the chief legal officer of the District of Columbia. While attorneys general previously were appointed by the mayor, District of Columbia voters approved a charter amendment in 2010 that ...

Karl Racine Karl Anthony Racine (born December 14, 1962) is a Haitian-American lawyer and politician. He is the first independently elected Attorney General of the District of Columbia, a position he has held since January 2015. Before that, he was the mana ...

alleging that the company offered misleading rent discounts on a rent-controlled building in Washington, D.C.

References

External links

* * {{Authority control 1969 establishments in Illinois 1993 initial public offerings Companies based in Chicago Companies listed on the New York Stock Exchange Financial services companies established in 1969 Real estate investment trusts of the United States Sovereign wealth fund portfolio companies