According to Chris Brooke, president and chief executive officerof Greater China at CBRE, this partnership represents a newbusiness model in the country's real estate industry. "This is thefirst time a domestic developer has established a JV with a serviceprovider on a countrywide basis to provide these kind of managementservices," he explains. "Traditionally, it's been done either on avery project-specific basis."

CBRE has been offering property management services in Chinasince the early 1990s, and today works with developers and ownersof high-end residential projects. To date, it's mostly been in onan "ad hoc" basis, says Brooke, adding that the firm has beenlooking to increase its property management critical mass acrossChina. CBRE currently manages 15 residential projects in China andthe JV will initially manage 12 projects being developed byVanke.

The JV, Brooke points out, is mutually beneficial. "Vanke had aprogram of working with partners as they focus on their corebusiness, outsourcing some of the service areas of the business,"Brooke relates. "They saw some benefits in terms of partnering withus, being able to outsource some of the higher-end proxy managementand securing best practices from our global international network.We saw the benefit of working with that type of client in China andexpanding our property management critical mass."