A customer of a large regional bank had an opportunity to purchase four separate parcels of real estate from a public utility company, located in Maryland and the District of Columbia. The properties were diverse and consisted of a suburban office building 100% leased to the United States government; a downtown property operated as a restaurant and office building; raw land zoned for residential development; and a long-term ground lease of land zoned for commercial development in the NOMA district of Washington, DC Knowing that timing was critical to its customer, the bank turned to us to prepare the loan commitments; to perform due diligence on title, survey and leasing issues; to document the loans for all four properties; and to supervise the closing. All four transactions closed simultaneously, less than five weeks after we began work. The bank and the borrower were both delighted with our dedication and extreme efficiency.
Case Studies - Real Estate
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Simultaneous Purchase of Four Separate Parcels of Real Estate
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Complex Property Development Issue
Through various entities controlled by three generations of family members, a client owned a large tract of property, including a lake, underground caverns, a museum, commercial and industrial property, Civil War battlefield relics, and property zoned for residential development. The property had been acquired over a period of 50 years, with no substantive planning for how development would actually occur. Numerous challenges faced our client, including the fact that the residential land had limited frontage and could not be developed efficiently, while the museum had good frontage but little development potential. Another issue was that easements to access the underground caverns could cast a cloud on title to the individual houses to be constructed on the residential land. Our team came together to form solutions, and over a period of several months, working with each generation of the family, we restructured the clients’ holdings so that the land could be developed efficiently without damaging the cultural, historical and personal significance of the other properties.
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Representation of Homebuilder in Successful Work-Out and Restructuring
We represented a regional homebuilder in a successful work-out and restructuring of $60 million in loans from several institutional lenders, secured by properties in Maryland, Virginia, Georgia and Florida. The lenders were not acting in a consortium, and they each had to be persuaded that it was in their best interest to negotiate and compromise, rather than fight to the death. Our client survived the downturn and was in a position to take advantage when the market improved.
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Bringing Together Appalachian Miners and European Businessmen in a Multi-Million Stock Sale
We represented the seller in a $45 million stock sale involving a large stone quarry operation in West Virginia with additional mineral rights and other assets in suburban Maryland. The purchaser was a multi-national public company. We deftly bridged the considerable culture gap between the Appalachian miners and the European businessmen, and by almost continuous negotiations, were able to hammer out a complex agreement over the Thanksgiving holiday. Since a transaction of this type involves (among other things) real estate, employee contracts, permits, mineral rights, equipment, vehicles and environmental issues, there is usually a period of several months between contract execution and closing. Since our client had a timing issue, the deal was closed over the New Year’s holiday in a round-the-clock session. The purchaser was so impressed that they hired the firm for their next U.S. acquisition.
For more information regarding Shapiro, Lifschitz & Schram’s Real Estate Practice, contact Department Chair Ronald S. Shapiro at shapiro@slslaw.com.
