Pre-Defined Peer Groups

Introduction

GRESB assigns each participant to a pre-defined peer group to contextualize their assessment results.

Peer groups do not directly influence the GRESB Score, Star Rating, or points achieved; however, they help put the GRESB Score into perspective relative to similar peers. Every reporting entity can see the characteristics of its pre-defined peer group within its Benchmark Report.

This page outlines how GRESB determines each entity’s pre-defined peer group.

Real Estate Assessment participants may also opt to incorporate a customized peer group into their Benchmark Report. Refer here for more information about customized peer groups.

Pre-Defined Peer Group Formation

GRESB determines an entity’s peer group using a simple, consistent set of quantitative rules. The table below illustrates the peer group creation process.

Each row in the table represents one ‘trial.’ The trial checks whether enough GRESB participants possess that row’s combination of characteristics.

If there are not sufficient entities with shared characteristics, one of the characteristics (e.g., Tenant-controlled) will be removed from consideration.

GRESB will only create the entity’s peer group once GRESB will only create the entity’s peer group once six entities (the participant + five peers) match that combination.

GRESB carries out this trial-and-error process individually for every reporting entity, meaning each entity’s peer group is uniquely its own. For example, just because Entity A has Entity B in its pre-defined peer group, Entity B might not have Entity A in its peer group. The groups are not ‘closed circles’ of entities.

GRESB considers each entity’s primary location, primary property type, legal status, investment style, and tenant-control status in forming its peer group. The peer group allocation methodology moves from most to least specific when testing combinations of characteristics.

For location, these are (in order of sequence/specificity): country, subregion, region, and super-region.

• The country, subregion, and region are defined using the UN country classification guidelines available here. The only super-regions used are Asia Pacific, grouped from Asia (code 142 in the UN classification) and Oceania (code 142 in the UN classification).

For property types, the most specific starting point is the property subtype (as reported in R1), followed by property type, and finally property sector.

GRESB determines an entity’s primary location and property type based on whether its underlying portfolio composition (as reported to indicator R1/DR1) meets a certain threshold.

See the Asset & Portfolio Classification page in Completing GRESB Assessments to learn more about GRESB's classification thresholds.

Legal status includes the following values (from indicator EC2):

• Listed

• Non-listed

• Government

Investment style includes the following values (from indicator EC2):

• Core

• Value-added

• Opportunistic

Tenant-controlled portfolios are defined as portfolios with more than 75% portfolio (by floor area) classified as Tenant controlled (from indicator R1/DR1).

Standing Investments Benchmark Peer Group Allocation Logic

Trial	Property Sub-type	Property Type	Property Sector	Country	Sub-region	Region	Super-region	Legal Status	Investment Style	Tenant Controlled
1	✓			✓				✓	✓	✓
2	✓			✓				✓	✓
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Development Benchmark Peer Group Allocation Logic

Trial	Property Sub-type	Property Type	Property Sector	Country	Sub-region	Region	Super-region	Legal Status	Investment Style
1	✓			✓				✓	✓
2	✓			✓				✓
3		✓		✓				✓	✓
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