Robert Dewitt

Mr. DeWitt was responsible for implementing the strategic goals and objectives of GID and served on the Executive Committee and various Investment Committees of the firm. His responsibilities included oversight responsibility and authority for corporate strategy development, new client/equity partner sourcing and procurement, property acquisitions and dispositions, client relations and overall management of the company. He served as President and CEO from December 7, 1998 to July 1, 2020 and January 1, 2021, respectively. Prior to serving as President and CEO, he was Senior Vice President of Acquisitions and Chief Investment Officer. Mr. DeWitt joined GID as Vice President of Acquisitions in 1987. From 1982 through 1987, he was Vice President of Acquisitions at Winthrop Financial Associates, then a major Boston-based national real estate investment banking and syndication firm.

Under Mr. DeWitt’s leadership, GID was transformed from a small, regional real estate owner/operator to the 26th largest owner of apartment properties in the United States with nearly $30 billion of gross assets under management. Mr. DeWitt was personally responsible for developing the ongoing, long-term equity co-investment joint venture relationships with the California Public Employees Retirement System (23 years), the Oregon Public Employees Retirement Fund (16 years) and the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (9 years), three of the largest and most sophisticated institutional investors in the world.

Mr. DeWitt represented GID in national trade organizations that furthered the business activities of GID. He was on the Board of Directors of the National Multifamily Housing Council and was its Chairman (2016-2017), Vice Chairman and Chairman of NMHC’s Political Action Committee (2014-2015), Treasurer (2012-2013), Secretary (2010-2011) and had served as the Chairman of NMHC’s GSE Futures Task Force (2009-2010). He was also a member of the Pension Real Estate Association and the Multifamily Green Council of the Urban Land Institute and past Chairman of the Multifamily Gold Council. He also served on the Governmental Affairs Committee of the Greater Boston Real Estate Board. Mr. DeWitt had appeared in numerous national and regional publications, CNBC’s Squawk Box and was a contributor to “Multifamily Housing: The Essential Industry Text,” published in 2015. Capping off his 40-year career, Mr. DeWitt was the sixth inductee into the Multifamily Executive Hall of Fame in 2021.

Mr. DeWitt served on the vestry and on the rector search committee of St. Peter’s Episcopal Church in his home town of Weston, MA. He also served on the Board of The Weston Golf Club and as the Golf Committee Chairman.

Mr. DeWitt received an MBA from The Amos Tuck School of Business Administration at Dartmouth College in 1982, a BA cum laude from Middlebury College in Middlebury, Vermont in 1978 and graduated high school from Deerfield Academy in 1974.