Joanne Feil
Among the many real estate assets that may be financed are ground or net leases. Despite many changes in the area of real estate finance over the past number of years, the legal criteria for determining financeability of a tenant's leasehold estate remain constant. Nevertheless, it is useful for the real estate practitioner to periodically take inventory of the standards. Certainty of leasehold financeability is essential, not only to any ground lessee or tenant that wants to finance the cost of constructing its leasehold improvements, but also to any tenant that decides to finance a portfolio of leasehold properties or whose corporate lender requires a collateral assignment of the tenant's interest in its leasehold estates as part of the security for a broader, corporate financing facility. The following sets forth fundamental issues to be considered in determining the financeability of a significant lease.
Features
Iain D. Johnston
The law enforcement community was unprepared for the onslaught of allegations of racial profiling because it never anticipated it would become an issue with massive legal and administrative consequences. Because the law enforcement community was generally unprepared, the result included costly litigation and onerous settlements, as well as a decrease in public confidence. Many of these consequences may have been avoided if the law enforcement community had initially recognized the issue and then prepared to address it.
Features
ALM Staff
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Law Journal Newsletters
Recent rulings of interest to you and your practice.
Features
David C. Whitlock
For years, the government has downplayed interior enforcement of our immigration laws. Inspections of I-9 compliance were nearly extinct; illegal workers thrived under a 'catch and release' deportation standard and lenient I-9 standard; and no one seemed to care about the Social Security mismatch problem. All of that is changing.
Mark G. Douglas
Whether an arbitration clause in a contract will be enforced by the bankruptcy courts in accordance with the Federal Arbitration Act has been the focus of numerous court decisions in recent times. The consensus among most courts addressing the issue has been that a bankruptcy court can adjudicate a dispute otherwise subject to binding arbitration if the dispute falls within the court's 'core' jurisdiction. Even so, rulings recently handed down by the Second and Third Circuit Courts of Appeal suggest that the scope of a bankruptcy court's retained discretion in this area may be even less broad than is generally understood.
Features
Jack Garson
Whether leasing new or existing premises, whether you are the landlord or tenant, the construction of improvements to your premises presents numerous concerns.
Features
Peter J.W. Sherwin
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Kenneth E. Aldous
Who do you turn to if you believe that an agreement is invalid? Should it make a difference if the agreement contains an arbitration clause? If it does have such a clause, can you nonetheless walk into court and have a judge decide? Or must the dispute go to arbitration? The Catch-22 is this: If an arbitrator were to determine that the agreement is invalid, the arbitrator logically would seem to have no jurisdiction over the matter to start with, because the arbitration clause therein should be invalid too. But if you were to litigate that dispute in court, and a judge determined that the agreement is valid, then an arbitrator should have resolved all disputes pursuant to the arbitration clause therein.
Suzanne Ilene Schiller
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Monica Mathews
When commercial landlords and tenants negotiate commercial lease agreements, the normal focus of their efforts is the essential conditions of the tenancy ' rent amount, lease term, option periods, and the like. Often overlooked, however, are those provisions generally considered 'standard boilerplate.' <i>Force majeure</i> clauses, in particular, are frequently viewed as miscellaneous paragraphs not worthy of lengthy consideration or discussion. Unfortunately, the pitfalls of a failure to carefully negotiate the force majeure provision of a commercial lease are often realized when a true catastrophic event occurs. In such situations, the tenant may be least able to withstand any additional hardship and needs the protection that a well-drafted force majeure provision can afford. At the same time, owners of commercial real estate that have suffered through the recent catastrophic and tragic events such as the terrorist attacks of 9/11 and hurricanes Katrina and Rita unquestionably have learned all too well that the force majeure clauses of their leases may be the only means of ensuring invaluable protections if or when a catastrophic event does occur.
Larry Bodine
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Suzanne Lowe
Management guru and author Peter Drucker said, 'If you can't measure it, you can't manage it.' So why is it that so few law firms measure their marketing efforts? Why is it that so many Chief Marketing Officers (CMOs) who are getting hammered by partners to demonstrate ROI on their efforts can't do it?
Daniel A. Lowenthal
Debtors in bankruptcy cases have long sought to make distributions to old equity without running afoul of the absolute priority rule. Time and again, debtors' efforts to leave old equity with value in a reorganized entity have been challenged in the appellate courts, and often in the Supreme Court. A proposed distribution to old equity in the complex Armstrong World Industries (AWI) case was struck down recently by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit Court. <i>In re Armstrong World Indus., Inc.</i>, 432 F.3d 507 (3rd Cir. 2005).
