Nature of Operations

12 Months Ended

Dec. 31, 2014

Accounting Policies [Abstract]

Nature of Operations

1. Nature of Operations

CBRE Group, Inc., a Delaware corporation (which may be referred to in these financial statements as the “company”, “we”, “us” and “our”), was incorporated on February 20, 2001. We are the world’s largest commercial real estate services and investment firm, based on 2014 revenue, with leading full-service operations in major metropolitan areas throughout the world. We offer a full range of services to occupiers, owners, lenders and investors in office, retail, industrial, multifamily and other types of commercial real estate. As of December 31, 2014, excluding independent affiliates, we operated in over 370 offices worldwide, with more than 52,000 employees providing commercial real estate services under the “CBRE” brand name, investment management services under the “CBRE Global Investors” brand name and development services under the “Trammell Crow” brand name. Our business is focused on several competencies, including commercial property and corporate facilities management, tenant/occupier and property/agency leasing, capital markets solutions (property sales, commercial mortgage origination and servicing, and debt/structured finance), real estate investment management, valuation, development services and proprietary research. We generate revenue from management fees on a contractual and per-project basis, and from commissions on transactions. Our contractual, fee-for-services businesses, which generally involve property and facilities management, mortgage loan servicing and investment management, represented approximately 46% of our 2014 revenue. In addition, our appraisal/valuation and leasing services have contractual elements and work for clients in these service lines is often recurring in nature.