"The expected investment horizon is one to two years, to acquire the $400 million in new properties," said Parks. "We have about $125 million in properties to bring to the venture right now, so we're well on our way."

Though the multiproperty JV is something new for Inland, Parks added that in some respects it's a continuation of the REIT's acquisition strategies. "The acquisition perimeters that we've agreed to run exactly in line with those properties we would buy for our own account," he said. "When we're investing concurrently with our partner, we're benefiting from the same kinds of properties that we would buy for ourselves."

According to the company's latest report, its net income for the third quarter of 2004 was $13.9 million ($0.21 per share), an increase of 27.5% compared to the third quarter of 2003. FFO in the same period was $20.2 million, an increase of 1.5% compared to Q3 2003, though the per-share FFO of $0.30 in the most recent quarter was the same as it was in Q3 2003. Parks said that the estimated FFO for all of 2004 now stands at $1.23 to $1.25, with the upper end of the estimate recently lowered to reflect the costs of starting the JV with Teachers' and the expense of complying with accounting reform requirements of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002.