Practice Strengths

Real Estate Transactions: Developing a new city

Client: A large national commercial and residential developer

Type of Matter: Mixed-use development

Our Client's Challenge:  To develop 400 acres of land in a largely undeveloped city south of Houston, Texas.

The Goal:  Bring all of the necessary facilities and infrastructure to the property in order to make the proposed development feasible and attractive to developers and end-users.

Our Strategy:  To work with the city leaders and other landowners to provide the agreements and incentives for development.

Results:  A portion of the property is under contract to a national homebuilder for the development of a master planned residential community; a portion of the property is under contract to a national commercial/retail shopping center developer for the construction of a regional mixed-use commercial/retail shopping center; and, the remainder of the property will be developed by the client with mixed-use commercial projects. A municipal utility has been formed to provide utilities to the development and the city has agreed to certain tax incentives.

Representative Experience:

• Negotiated the $51 million land purchase, created the necessary public and private entities and crafted permitting and joint operating agreements for a 2,500-room hotel linked to the $400 million Orlando Convention Center Expansion, which was among the largest in the United States.
• Represented the owners of 85 acres of land east of Ovideo, Florida, to be developed as the center of a new community that will be the second largest in the area, divided equally between residential and retail/commercial applications.
• Represented New York television production facilities in connection with the construction and equipping of related studios.
• Represented a major life insurance company in connection with the $145 million financing of Riverside Plaza in Chicago, Illinois. This office and retail complex is located largely within an air rights parcel, beneath which is a major railway station for Amtrak and commuter trains. Complex easement and operating agreements were reviewed and analyzed, and unique estoppel certificates and indemnity agreements were obtained. The project also involved extensive review, analysis and summarization of numerous tenant leases within a short period of time.
• Represented publicly traded real estate entity in the purchase of ten office buildings in the greater Houston, Texas, area containing 800,000 square feet of office space.
• Represented fourth-generation owners who were selling their land near the Orlando, Florida, airport, handling the transaction as a tax-deferred exchange and increasing the land value by, among other things, clearing zoning and title matters. The land that would have sold for $17 million will now bring the owners $100 million.
• Represented The E.W. Scripps Company in connection with its construction and relocation of printing plants in Florida and Tennessee.
• Represented the Nature Conservancy and several state and federal agencies in the $81 million acquisition of 90,000 environmentally sensitive acres for the Everglades Reclamation Project.
• Represented numerous landlords and tenants in negotiating office leases throughout the country, including representing landlords in the leasing, operation and management of various so-called “trophy buildings."
• Represented a public company in the $25 million purchase of mineral property royalty interests in operating gold/copper mines in Mexico and Nevada.
• Represented a large national freight forwarding company in connection with its acquisition of six office warehouse facilities located in Texas, California, Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin and Oregon and the contemporaneous assignment of the purchase agreement to an investment group, subject to the existing leases in favor of our client.

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