PRAEDIUM GROUP AND THE SHIDLER GROUP ACQUIRE SAN DIEGO'S OLD GROVE CORPORATE CENTER FOR $5.6 MILLION

New York, N.Y., and San Diego, Calif. (March 2003) - A joint venture between The Praedium Group, LLC (Praedium), a New York City-based national real estate investment firm, and San Diego-based The Shidler Group, today announced the $5.6 million purchase of Old Grove Corporate Center, also known as 9900 Old Grove Road, from Orange, Calif.-based ORMCO Corporation. The 76,190 square-foot corporate headquarters office property is well located in the San Diego submarket of Scripps Ranch, with freeway signage visibility and an above-average parking count. The entire building was remodeled in 1994 and $1.4 million was spent to improve 55% of the building last year.

Christopher Hughes, Praedium Group principal, noted, "We invested in this office building due to its highly visible location off of I-15 within Scripps Ranch. This represented an attractive lease-up opportunity, as this corridor is among the most desirable locations within the San Diego metro area."

"This acquisition is a prototypical transaction for us, whereby we are buying a class "B" building in an "A" location at less then 50% of replacement cost. We think that we can create substantial value because of the building's tremendous freeway visibility and excess parking," said Matt Root, partner, The Shidler Group.

Praedium recently partnered with The Shidler Group in the $11 million purchase of 15015 Avenue of Science, a two-story Class "A" flex office building totaling 85,090 square feet in the Rancho Bernardo submarket of San Diego, California.

The Praedium Group is a real estate investor focusing on underperforming and undervalued assets throughout North America, with more than $2 billion in total investments to date. Praedium was formed in 1991 with a leading international investment bank as its sole investor.

Building on the experience and exposure gained through this original investment program, Praedium has been a sponsor of commingled real estate private equity funds since 1994. The funds sponsored by Praedium have attracted investors that include public and corporate pension funds, financial institutions, insurance companies and endowments.

Praedium recently closed on a $465 million real estate private equity fund, Praedium Fund V. This equity will be leveraged to acquire $1.5 billion in properties over the next two years. The fund will invest in mid-cap assets throughout the United States and Canada in the $10 to $60 million range, targeting multi-family, office, retail and industrial property types. For more information please see www.praediumgroup.com.