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Articles Posted in Real Estate Development

JCatalano200x300-200x300ORivera2014An article authored by the firm’s Oscar R. Rivera and John Catalano is now featured on the homepage and will soon appear in the print edition of the Daily Business Review, South Florida’s exclusive business daily and official court newspaper.  The article, which is titled “Ruling Reminds Fla.’s Courts, Property Owners of Legal Precedents for Removal of Obsolete Restrictive Covenants,” focuses on the takeaways from a recent decision by Florida’s First District Court of Appeal on the state’s legal procedure for making antiquated restrictive covenants that have been rendered obsolete by modern development go away.  Their article reads:

. . . The decision came in mid-October in Gate Venture v. Arthur Chester Skinner. The case stems from a 2007 transaction in which Skinner et al. conveyed to Gateway Professional Campus, LLC approximately 15 acres pursuant to a warranty deed that included restrictions limiting future development solely to professional and medical offices.

Since the time of the conveyance, significant development of the surrounding properties and changes to their zoning classifications have taken place, and Skinner et al. no longer owns any adjacent or nearby real estate. This led Gateway to pursue the removal of the restrictions via an agreement with Skinner and its partners, and it provided the original sellers with a site plan and information on its intentions to now develop the property as a multi-family community that would complement, not compete with, the surrounding properties.

dbr-logo-1-300x57Unfortunately for Gateway, its complaint alleges the request was “met with opposition” and could not be accommodated. Among the “opposition,” the representatives of the original sellers indicated they would agree to remove the restrictions in exchange for $6 million.

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ORivera2014Firm managing shareholder Oscar R. Rivera authored an article that is featured in the online edition of today’s Daily Business Review, South Florida’s exclusive business daily and official court newspaper, and will soon be appearing in the “Board of Contributors” page of the print edition.  The article, which is titled “Potential Pitfalls to Avoid with Restrictive Clauses in Outparcel Sales, Developments for CRE Owners,” focuses on the growing trend of the carving out of parts of shopping centers and mall parking lots to create “outparcels” for stores, restaurants, and even multi-family apartments.  He notes that the growth of online shopping and curbside pickup at major big-box retailers and grocery chains has diminished the need for vast parking fields for in-store shoppers, and property owners are trying to tap into the growing appeal of mixed-use sites that provide a live, work and play experience.  Oscar’s article reads:

. . . However, for commercial real estate owners hoping to create and sell an outparcel for further redevelopment, or even acquire an existing outparcel owned by others for their own redevelopment, there is a significant potential hitch that must be addressed prior to closing. This issue requires the utmost care and attention, and is oftentimes overlooked, only to cause potential snags down the line.

out-parcel-300x166The application of a property’s current restrictive covenants with existing tenants in outparcel deals can become a challenge depending on the nature of the plans for the new or redeveloped site. CRE owners can never lose sight of the fact that the new store/restaurant category or other planned use for a newly created outparcel being marketed and sold to a third party should not run afoul of the restrictive use clauses contained in the lease agreements with their property’s existing tenants. Otherwise, they can expose themselves to serious legal liability if the new enterprise planned for the outparcel is in a category that is a protected exclusive for any of the current tenant(s) at the property or a prohibited use that is forbidden by existing leases.

Therefore, always in close consultation with experienced CRE attorneys, owners need to address any such restricted uses that may be in play with all the parties prior to finalizing any transaction. dbr-logo-300x57The most efficient and effective way to do so would be to make the outparcel buyer aware of all the existing exclusives and restricted uses, and then negotiate their inclusion in the sales contract as an exhibit and as a covenant running with the parcel being purchased. The latter causes these exclusives and restricted uses to be a title burden that runs with the land and binds not only the current owner, but also all future owners and tenants on the outparcel.

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Florida’s governor recently signed a new bill into law, House Bill 337, limiting a local government’s ability to impose impact fees on builders and developers embarking on new residential and commercial construction projects. The law, which took effect immediately and whose limits will be applied retroactively for increases in impact fees made since January 1, 2021, aims to prevent counties from hiking up costs associated with new builds.

An impact fee is a one-time fee assessed by local governments to developers and builders to offset a new development’s impact on existing infrastructure. The rationale behind the assessment is to essentially charge a tax on new construction to defray its costs on existing vital services such as schools, parks, roads and emergency services. Think: An increase in residents and users equals more of a burden on existing infrastructure.

Onestpeterendering-300x168Unfortunately, for years developers have complained that the impact fees collected by local governments are not actually used by the municipalities for remediating the impact the new growth has on the infrastructure at all. Oftentimes, developers argue that instead of investing the impact fee funds on improvements to the existing infrastructure affected by a new project, the impact fee funds are diverted to areas not remotely impacted by the new construction and are actually squandered away on other pet projects of local governments.

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In a world where ride services such as Uber and Lyft have become widespread, and electric cars are becoming extremely popular, many are asking themselves what that means for parking lots going into the future. In the past, office and retail tenants relied on serious negotiations and a series of analyses to figure out acceptable parking ratios for their stores and offices. But can we expect the same parking concerns from commercial real estate tenants in the future, or will their focus shift to other interests such as charging stations and drop-off/pick-up zones?

Parking ratios are generally established by local zoning codes. The parking ratio is a statistic commonly used to determine the number of parking spaces available for use by each commercial tenant. The total parking spaces available are divided by the property’s entire gross leasable area, with the ratio most commonly expressed per every 1,000 sq. ft. of property.

prking-300x225Most retail stores require four spaces per 1,000 sq. ft., while restaurants are typically allocated more parking spaces for every 1,000 sq. ft. These numbers can vary depending on the property type.

Besides ensuring that the correct number of parking spots are assigned, big box stores like Marshalls, Old Navy, Best Buy, and grocery stores such as Publix, serving as anchor stores, also require specific parking fields in front of their stores and demand certain parking ratio minimums. It is not uncommon for these tenants to designate protected parking areas, prohibiting landlords from ever changing, rearranging or reassigning their parking spaces, and to maintain architectural control over their parking areas.

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nsiegfriedjmilesThe firm’s Joseph A. Miles and Nicholas D. Siegfried were featured in an article in today’s edition of the Daily Business Review, South Florida’s exclusive business daily and official court newspaper, about a major verdict that they recently secured for one of the firm’s clients.  The article, which is titled “South Florida Lawyers Win $4.1M for Cable Company Fired Over Service Delays,” focuses on their work in securing the verdict for an affiliate of Miami-based OpticalTel in a case involving the company’s wrongful termination by a Central Florida HOA.  The article reads:

Coral Gables lawyers Joseph A. Miles and Nicholas D. Siegfried landed a $4.1 million verdict for Miami-based company PC Services LLC, which claimed the Cascades of Groveland Homeowners’ Association Inc. in Lake County should never have terminated an agreement with the company because it wasn’t responsible for a flurry of delays and problems with services.

The 2012 lawsuit arose from years of bad blood between the parties over a deal that turned sour. On July 2007, the homeowner association terminated its contract with PC Services, claiming it had failed to properly do its job. But PC Services argued it had and lost the opportunity to make a profit on its $1.6 million investment.

The defense argued it was right to terminate the agreement because it didn’t get what PC Services promised.

dbrlogo-300x57Defense lawyers Aristides J. Diaz and Thomas R. Slaten Jr. of Larsen & Associates in Orlando did not respond to requests for comment before deadline.

Making the case was no small feat for the Siegfried Rivera lawyers, as it was laced with technical jargon that would likely stump the average juror.

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The use of the limited liability company (“LLC”) corporate structure has become very common in the real estate industry. It is the go to structure for the acquisition and development of properties by parties joining together behind a venture.  LLCs are governed by operating agreements among the members. These agreements are akin to the shareholder agreements among the shareholders of closely held corporations, and they govern many aspects of the operations of the venture.  One element in these operating agreements that bears close scrutiny by all of the members is the enforcement mechanisms that they put in place should any members fail to honor their obligations to fund future capital calls.

In truth, many LLC operating agreements contain inadequate payment enforcement provisions, making them potentially problematic and inequitable for the company itself and the members who honor their obligations and make future capital calls on a timely basis.  For example, if a member fails to meet their financial obligations, it is fairly common for these agreements to provide that the other members of the LLC may contribute the missing funds and treat them as a loan to the non-funding member.  Often times, the agreements provide that the loan will then be repaid to the funding members, with interest, once the LLC is in a position to make future distributions to its members, with no further enforcement methodology.

Such arrangements provide an unmerited level of flexibility to the non-funding member, as it enables them to weigh the pros and cons of making their required contributions or taking a loan from their partners to avoid any additional loss risk exposure in the endeavor.

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OscarRivera2014.jpgThe firm’s Oscar R. Rivera wrote an article that appeared today in the Daily Business Review, South Florida’s exclusive business daily and official court newspaper. The article, which was titled “Best Practices for Buyouts of Unit Owners at Older Condos,” discusses recent changes in the Florida condominium termination law and important considerations for developers in these property acquisitions. Oscar’s article reads:

In the last several weeks we learned of a building in Surfside where the developer successfully bought out all of the units from their owners and another in the Brickell area where the developer purchased 60 of the 61 residences from their owners and is now using the statutory condo termination process to acquire the remaining unit and commence its development plans.

During last year’s legislative session, Florida lawmakers made changes to the condominium termination statute that made the process considerably fairer for unit owners. Now owners who are current on their mortgages and association fees must get fair market value, and their entire first-mortgage debt must be satisfied even if it exceeds the current fair market value.

In addition, for the original owners who maintain it as their homestead property, they must be offered their original purchase price regardless of whether it exceeds the current fair market value. The changes also enable some owners to rent their units for a year before moving out and receive a 1 percent relocation fee.

In light of these changes and in an effort to avoid any delays and additional costs due to holdout owners and related litigation, it greatly behooves developers in these buyouts to carefully assess and determine the valuation of the property in order to make very fair and enticing offers to the unit owners.

Keep in mind that the price that is offered to every owner will be based on the same exact price per square foot for every residence in the building, so the square-foot price must be high enough to entice even the owners of the most lavish units with the best views.

His article concludes:

The most effective approach is for the developer to work very closely with the association’s board of directors in order to get all of the pertinent information into the hands of every owner at the property. Meetings with the owners to answer all of their questions and allay any of their concerns are also a priority.

The contracts that are presented to all of the owners will be identical, except of course for their corresponding unit number, owner’s name and purchase price based on the square footage. There are no financing contingencies or property inspections required, but they do include contingency clauses indicating the required critical mass of units that must accept in order for the offers to be valid. They also include extension clauses to enable the developer to extend the deadline in case of litigation or other delays due to some of the logistics of the condo termination process.

In many cases, the only negotiations that take place with some of the individual owners involve their requests to remain in their residences and pay rent to the developer for a number of months after the closing. Developers should remain flexible in accommodating these requests, as typically they will not be able to begin the teardown of the property for months after the closings while other aspects of the condo termination and development processes are underway.

Our firm congratulates Oscar for sharing his insights into this important and timely topic for real estate developers with the readers of the Daily Business Review. Click here to read the complete article in the newspaper’s website (registration required).

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A recent ruling involving a lawsuit by Wells Fargo Bank against the former ownership group of the Palm Beach Mall is emblematic of the post-recession efforts of lenders to recover damages from their commercial real estate borrowers. The convoluted case included several counts alleging various types of damages against the former owners and operators of the mall, but the lender lost on all of its counts and motions in both the trial and appellate courts. While it ultimately may not have impacted the outcome, a couple of seemingly minor mistakes and omissions in the guaranty and loan agreements created significant difficulties for the lender that it was unable to overcome in court.

The recent opinion by the Fourth District Court of Appeal in the case of Wells Fargo Bank v. Palm Beach Mall et al. affirmed the lower court’s decision in favor of the mall’s former ownership group on all counts. The lender had alleged that the mall owners breached the loan agreement by engaging in gross negligence or willful misconduct in its management and also by failing to maintain its status as a “special purpose entity” by not remaining solvent and by paying its liabilities and expenses from sources other than its own funds and assets. It sought to recover the entire outstanding amount of debt owed by the former owner, which had defaulted on its loan and issued the deed for the property to the lender in order to avoid foreclosure.

The appellate panel found that the trial court correctly applied New York contract law, on which the loan agreement was based, when it interpreted the language in the loan agreement to mean that the mall owner would be liable only if it performed deliberate acts beyond acting out of its own economic self-interest. The opinion holds that the owners did not act with reckless indifference to the rights of lender, which is the standard that must be applied under New York law for a finding of gross negligence under an exculpatory clause.

PBM.JPGAs to the issue of the owner’s insolvency, because the loan agreement failed to define “solvent” or “insolvent” the appellate court ruled that the trial court was correct in rejecting Wells Fargo’s balance-sheet insolvency definition (i.e., a company’s assets exceed its liabilities) in favor of the New York common law equity insolvency definition (i.e., the inability to pay debts and obligations as they become due in the regular course of business) in its interpretation of the loan agreement. Therefore, the mall owner did not breach the “special purpose entity” covenant in the agreement, as it was paying its liabilities and expenses as they came due and correctly using capital contributions from a member of the ownership group to make the loan payments and meet its operating expenses.

The appellate court also was not swayed by the lender’s argument that the trial court erred in refusing to treat the “single purpose entity” language, which was used once in the guaranty agreement, as “special purpose entity,” which was used throughout the loan agreement, or to reform the guaranty agreement accordingly. The appellate panel found that the trial court correctly pointed out that Wells Fargo, as an assignee of the original loan, was not party to the negotiations which gave rise to the loan documents, and as such it was not in a position to argue whether or not the use of “single” rather than “special” in this instance was intentional or not.

While it may not have changed the ultimate outcome in the case, it does appear that the use of the word “single” in the clause in question was likely a mistake in the guaranty agreement that should have been detected and corrected by the original lender prior to execution of the agreement, thereby ensuring that the term “special purpose entity” was used consistently throughout all of the loan documents, including in the guaranty agreement. In addition, the lack of a reference for the specific definition of insolvency as well as the standard for gross negligence that were to be applied under the loan agreement were errors of omission.

These errors and omissions in the guaranty agreement and the loan agreement proved to be very problematic for the eventual assignee of the original loan, and they illustrate the importance of making these documents involving large commercial real estate loans as specific and comprehensive as possible.

A report earlier this week in the Tampa Bay Times about the brisk pace of sales at the new One St. Petersburg luxury condominium illustrated the changes that are taking place in the city’s downtown area. The article reported that buyers at the new development, which at 41 stories will be the tallest building in the city, have reserved 104 of the 253 units since they were introduced a few months ago, totaling more than $106 million in sales.

Located at First Street and First Avenue N., the new tower is attracting residents with its prime location near the downtown waterfront and its many restaurants and shops. Other nearby offerings, including the Salvador and Bliss condo towers, are also enjoying strong presales.

As this article shows, condominium development in areas outside of South Florida has joined the pace of what we’ve seen in the South Florida market. Below is an artist rendering of the new towers flanked by two neighboring buildings, and the complete article can be found by clicking here.

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New condominium developments often face significant challenges from municipalities and neighboring property owners. As the wave of condo development in Florida appears to have no end in sight, developers should be cognizant of potential complaints that may be raised against their proposed towers, and they should be prepared to negotiate to win all of the necessary approvals and overcome the challenges that are presented.

The struggles facing the new Bliss 18-story luxury condo tower planned for downtown St. Petersburg are emblematic of the types of hurdles that some new projects must overcome. An article earlier this week in the Tampa Bay Times chronicles the difficult road that the development has been forced to navigate. The challenges include allegations by a nearby property owner that the project violates the city’s comprehensive land-use plan as well as a lawsuit by the association of a neighboring condominium claiming that cars waiting to use the project’s planned elevator to transport vehicles to their parking spaces would clog the access alley also used by the condominium and create a safety hazard.

Click here to read the newspaper article and learn about the developer’s concessions to address and overcome these obstacles. Below is an artist rendering of the proposed tower.

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