Spotlight: Griffin Capital and Its Opportunity Zone, DST and Build-to-Rent Platforms

The El Segundo manager built and exited a series of non-traded REITs and interval funds, and now runs exclusively rental housing through Reg D private placements.

August 26, 2026

Griffin Capital Company, LLC is a real estate investment manager in El Segundo, California, founded in 1995 by Kevin Shields, who serves as chairman and co-chief executive officer alongside co-CEO Nick Rosenthal. The firm reports it has owned, managed, sponsored or co-sponsored approximately $25 billion in assets and raised $18 billion in equity as of December 31, 2025, and notes that the asset figure includes estimated total project costs for assets under construction. Senior executives and employees have co-invested over $300 million across the firm’s verticals.

Griffin Capital’s investment team is now exclusively focused on rental housing, with strategies in multifamily, build-to-rent and student housing. As of September 30, 2025 the firm reported 41 communities comprising over 13,667 multifamily units and 693 student housing beds, at a total project value exceeding $4.4 billion. That is a narrower business than Griffin Capital ran five years ago, and the reason is a sequence of exits.

The platforms Griffin Capital built and sold

In May 2022 Griffin Capital sold its 1940 Act interval fund management business — the Griffin Institutional Access Real Estate Fund and Griffin Institutional Access Credit Fund, together with their SEC-registered advisers — to Apollo Global Management, in a transaction the firm associates with roughly $6.5 billion in equity. Griffin Capital Securities, the FINRA-registered broker-dealer that had served as dealer manager for the firm’s REITs and private placements, was also sold to Apollo, closing March 1, 2022.

The non-traded REITs exited as well. Griffin-American Healthcare REIT II was sold to Northstar Realty Finance in December 2014 for $4 billion. Griffin-American Healthcare REIT III and IV were merged and internalized into a combined $4.7 billion healthcare REIT in October 2022, which listed on the NYSE in February 2024. Peakstone Realty Trust was formed by the April 2019 $4.7 billion merger of the two Griffin Capital Essential Asset REITs, grew to a $5.8 billion enterprise after acquiring assets from CCIT II, and listed on the NYSE in April 2023.

The Reg D lineup

What Griffin Capital sponsors today is a Reg D private placement platform: Qualified Opportunity Zone Funds I through IV, Griffin Capital Development Partners Fund II, and standalone multifamily Delaware Statutory Trust offerings. The firm puts approximately $2 billion of equity committed across them, supporting 34 multifamily communities at over $3.74 billion in total project costs.

The Opportunity Zone series is the largest piece. Fund I closed in September 2020 with about $460 million, Fund II in late 2021 with about $585 million, and Fund III in March 2024 with about $586 million against a seven-property, 2,398-unit portfolio and $802 million in estimated project cost. Fund IV is in market. Griffin Capital reported over $1.9 billion raised across the four funds, covering 30 multifamily properties and $3.5 billion in total project cost.

Griffin Capital has also made its case for the program in public. The firm commissioned an economic impact analysis, run through IMPLAN and based on estimated development costs and operating data as of December 31, 2024 across each property’s expected hold period, projecting $7.55 billion in total economic impact and 3,382 average annual jobs supported. Griffin Capital states these are estimates and not a guarantee of investor performance or of the impact that will actually be realized. Rosenthal’s stated position is that housing affordability is best addressed by new supply, and that the Opportunity Zone program shows what private capital will do when given the incentive.

Build-to-rent and the DST shelf

In September 2025 Griffin Capital formed Griffin Capital Residential Partners within its Griffin Residential Investment Platform, a dedicated build-to-rent division led by co-CEOs Jonathan Trott and David Platter. Both were previously co-chief investment officers at Capital Square, and before that led the build-for-rent division at Amherst.

The DST offerings run through Griffin Capital Institutional Property Exchange. The Heritage–Gonzales, Louisiana DST was fully subscribed in March 2026 after raising over $37 million on The Oaks at Riverbend, a 299-unit community near Baton Rouge. Currently in market is the Union–Kansas City DST, a Rule 506(c) offering carrying a $25,000 minimum; a Form D amendment dated July 30, 2026 reported $51.4 million of a $59.9 million offering sold to 133 investors. The selling group is weighted toward independent broker-dealers and 1031 specialists, including Cetera Wealth Services, Cambridge Investment Research, Concorde Investment Services, DFPG Investments and Realized Financial.

On the research side, Steve Guggenmos joined as director of housing market research after leading multifamily research and modeling at Freddie Mac. In March 2026 Griffin Capital acquired and began construction on University Parkway, a 345-unit garden-style multifamily development in Gwinnett County outside Atlanta, with completion expected in 2028.