Retail took a big hit in 2022 with 17,145 shops closing, a 50% increase on 2021. Large and small names alike were effected: Joules, M&Co and T M Lewin were hit hard, totalling 6,055 shop closures and 151,500 jobs lost. 1/3 of these closures were due to insolvency and the rest because of need to … Continue Reading
The Product Security and Telecommunications Infrastructure Act 2022 received Royal Assent on 6th December 2022. This means greater balance towards landowners and telecoms operators along with supporting 5G and fibre network rollouts. However, there still needs to be more regulations to be passed for the provisions to become effective in 2023. Read the full article … Continue Reading
We have recently seen what may be the first award made under the arbitration scheme established under the Commercial Rent (Coronavirus) Act 2022. Ernest Jones and H Samuel, jewellery retailers, has been ordered to pay £450,000 in unpaid office rent, where it had been argued that the offices, its headquarters, served purely to support its … Continue Reading
On February 2, 2022, the California Court of Appeal, Fourth Appellate District, changed the status of a decision in January from unpublished to published. The decision is significant for its clear and unequivocal ruling that the California Density Bonus Law (Cal. Gov. Code, § 65915 et seq.) prevails over local zoning and land use requirements … Continue Reading
An ordinance that the San Francisco Board of Supervisors passed on Jan. 25 will require landlords to give residential tenants a 10-day notice and an opportunity to cure before commencing eviction proceedings for just cause. This extends the three-day notice requirement under state law. The 10-day notice and cure requirement will apply to just cause … Continue Reading
This post was also written by Gerald S. Dickinson. Pennsylvania municipalities and potential developers interested in converting vacant, abandoned, tax delinquent or foreclosed properties into productive use should take note of legislation enacted in 2012 that permits a municipality with more than 10,000 residents to create a land bank.1 Land banks are governmental entities that … Continue Reading
The Garden State is forging ahead with rebuilding efforts after Superstorm Sandy devastated the Jersey Shore last October. One of the largest proposed projects is a $3 billion dune-replenishment project set to start May 1. This proposed coastal protection system would create 22-foot-tall dunes along the coast, forming a natural barrier against storms to protect … Continue Reading
Last week, two more federal district courts dismissed suits seeking to collect transfer real estate taxes from Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and their conservator, the Federal Housing Finance Agency. Counties in New Jersey and Maryland had brought class action suits, arguing the government-backed mortgage guarantors failed to pay state and local real estate transfer taxes … Continue Reading
Last year in this space we reported on a pair of Michigan court decisions (51382 Gratiot Avenue Holdings, Inc. v. Chesterfield Development Company (Chesterfield) and Wells Fargo Bank, N.A. v. Cherryland Mall (Cherryland), which each held that a CMBS borrower’s insolvency could trigger personal liability on the part of its non-recourse carve-out guarantor. Those decisions … Continue Reading
With cash-strapped states and counties feeling increasing budgetary pressure, lawsuits seeking to collect real estate transfer taxes from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are popping up all over the nation. In the wake of the economic downturn, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have acquired vast portfolios of properties. It’s no wonder states have their eyes … Continue Reading
A recent opinion by New York’s highest court (J. D’Addario & Co. v. Embassy Indus., Inc. Slip Op 07850, Court of Appeals) held that a seller’s "sole remedy" of retaining the purchaser’s deposit as "liquidated damages" means just that – that’s all you get (i.e., no court-imposed interest unless you expressly say so). In the … Continue Reading
This post was written by Meredith Hartley and Robert Diamond. On January 14, 2013, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals held that liability under the anti-fraud provisions of the Interstate Land Sales Full Disclosure Act (“ILSA”) extends to an entity that engaged in advertising or marketing activities in the course of a transaction covered by … Continue Reading
Since the In re Crane decision was handed down by the Bankruptcy Court for the Central District of Illinois in April 2012, all eyes in the mortgage banking industry have been focused on the appeal of the decision pending in the U.S. District Court, in the hopes that the widely criticized ruling of the Bankruptcy … Continue Reading
Title to Oil and Gas in PA Threatened In 1882, the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania pronounced what would be known as the Rule in Dunham’s Case. In Dunham and Shortt v. Kirkpatrick, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court held that a grant or reservation of "all minerals" does not include oil or gas, despite the fact that … Continue Reading
On July 26, 2012, in a decision of major significance to the Marcellus Shale industry, the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court in the case of Robinson Township et al. v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission et al., No. 284 M.D. 2012 (Pa. Commw. Ct. 2012), declared Section 3304 of Act 13 of Pennsylvania’s Oil and Gas … Continue Reading
A class-action complaint, filed this July in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania, seeks millions of dollars in damages from four telecom companies, alleging a deliberate failure to obtain the permission of hundreds of Beaver County property owners before burying fiber-optic cables on their lands. According to the plaintiffs in Lake … Continue Reading
Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder recently signed into law the Nonrecourse Mortgage Loan Act, MCL Sec. 445.1591, et seq., the purpose of which was to overturn the effect of two Michigan court decisions that interpreted and applied certain special purpose entity (SPE) and nonrecourse "carve-out" loan provisions in a way that seemed to favor lenders, and … Continue Reading
In In re Crane, the Bankruptcy Court for the Central District of Illinois recently held that a mortgage can be avoided in bankruptcy if it fails to include the maturity date and the interest rate of the underlying debt within the mortgage document. The court found that failing to include these loan terms on the … Continue Reading
The City of Chicago has prevailed in the latest round of a "no holds barred" battle with local property owners over the constitutionality of The Chicago Landmarks Ordinance. In a decision dated May 2, 2012 by the Circuit Court of Cook County, the property owners' claims that the Landmarks Ordinance was unconstitutionally vague and violated due process were rejected, and the court upheld the Ordinance. Hanna and Mrowka v. City of Chicago. No. 06 CH 19422. The landowners had previously won a highly favorable ruling at the appellate court level (in 2009), which raised the prospect of the invalidation of the Ordinance (as reported in a previous Reed Smith Client Alert) - a result that would have sent shockwaves through the historic preservation community nationwide. With the case remanded to it for decision, the trial court considered the due process vagueness issue in detail, including as to the clarity of the Ordinance's criteria for landmark status; but it was not persuaded by the property owners' arguments, and found that they did not meet their burden of rebutting the presumption of the constitutionality of the legislation, thus upholding the Ordinance.… Continue Reading
In the world of securitized commercial mortgages, non-recourse carveout guaranties have long been a matter of standard practice. For CMBS lenders, they offer a critical backstop against fiscal mischief by borrowers, and for responsible borrowers they provide access to real estate financing without fear of personal ruin. Nevertheless, two recent court decisions have thrown the … Continue Reading
Real estate purchasers whose contract permits the return of the earnest money deposit if financing cannot be obtained must be extremely careful in how this contingency is worded in the purchase contract, or a purchaser may get an unwelcome surprise, and be forced to forfeit the earnest money when financing cannot be obtained. Typically, when … Continue Reading
Chicago's Vacant Building Ordinance, which imposes substantial and unprecedented duties on mortgagees of residential real estate located in the city of Chicago, continues to generate controversy - and lawsuits.… Continue Reading