Mid-America is part of the Mid-America Group, which had also hada partnership with Pacific Realty of Omaha to serve Grubb &Ellis; it was thought that both companies could serve Iowa andNebraska, says Pat Hurley, SVP with Grubb & Ellis. However,Pacific Realty left last year to only cover Nebraska, andMid-America was left to fend for itself. "We started talking withthem in January to come back on," Hurley tells GlobeSt.com. "We nowhad this hole in Iowa that we needed to fill."

He says Iowa is an important market for Grubb & Ellis."There's a lot of insurance companies in Des Moines, including oneof our clients, Principal Financial Group, as well as a lot ofretail. We have 46 affiliates in 68 markets, we like to have afootprint in a lot of locations," Hurley says. The office here has22 employees, including Larry Cedarstrom, president of the newlymerged office.

The move also fits in with the company's Midwest strategy, saysHurley, though it's been hard to say where to keep and startoffices. "The Midwest is kind of a mixed bag," he says. "You lookat Detroit, that's a difficult market, but our Grand Rapids, MIoffice is having one of its best years in 10 years. We're in St.Louis fairly strong, and Kansas City, MO, but then you haveWichita, KS with the struggling aerospace industry." He saysbasically, corporations expect the company to have the Midwestpresence. "Our most recent office opened in Bentonville, AK, withits 20,000 Wal-Mart employees, an area that you could consider theMidwest. The only place we're looking to go in the region is theDakotas; say the Fargo area. We'll see if we can get somebody, butwe want to make sure they have the expertise needed. We're lookingat a few companies, but don't plan a decision anytime soon."