[6] In 1936, LJ Hooker purchased the real estate business and offices of Woods & Co. in Kensington and Kingsford.

[3] The following year, LJ Hooker established its headquarters in Pitt Street, Sydney by buying H. L. Cross & Co., a city agency.

[7][8] In 1946, LJ Hooker bought the real estate business of Harold Bray Pty Ltd in Bondi Beach.

[3] The following year, LJ Hooker purchased F. Egan & Son, a real estate agency in Bondi Junction.

[citation needed] In 1950, the tenth office was opened in Crows Nest[9] and in 1951 the Manly office was opened after the purchase of Thorn Coleman & Co.[7][10] LJ Hooker's expansion continued, and by 1953 the agency was the largest real estate agency in Australia.

[18] In the mid-1980s, while led briefly by CEO George Herscu, LJ Hooker crossed into development and acquisition of retailers and large scale shopping complexes in the United States.

[19] This move proved ill-conceived, with such ventures as the purchase and operation of several storied American department store chains as B. Altman & Co., Bonwit Teller, Sakowitz and Parisian stores, to be used as anchors for a number of large shopping malls in the United States.

[19] Having no track record in understanding the complex operations required to run retail department stores, this venture proved deeply flawed and plunged LJ Hooker, the department stores and its various development holdings into bankruptcy.

This period, although brief in its history, was deeply tumultuous and troubling and led to LJ Hooker Limited being purchased by the Queensland based Suncorp-Metway, in January 1989.

[23] In 2003, LJ Hooker purchased the real estate franchise group Olsen & Everson.