Commercial Real Estate Finance

Posts Tagged ‘credit crisis’

These days, among all construction sites, stalled developments are sure to outnumber active ones. As Daniel Dirscherl, general manager at Hunter Roberts Construction Group LLC in Philadelphia, states, “there’s not a lot of large projects. Institutional work is what is out there now – higher ed, health care, and public works.” This is very apparent living in Philadelphia, a city whose downtown is dominated by large ever expanding universities (Penn, Drexel, Temple, and Thomas Jefferson). Alumni support may have gone down in the last couple years, but from an outsider’s perspective universities appear impervious to the economic downturn. Read the rest of this entry »

After reading an article in Bloomberg delineating why hotel investors are flocking to Europe I came to the conclusion that being a hotel owner in this “land of opportunity” seems to be less of a blessing and more of a curse these days.  Higher development rates have helped deteriorate property values in the US compared to Europe, which means more real estate investors are looking to plant their money across the Atlantic this year and for the foreseeable future. Read the rest of this entry »

CMBS stands for commercial mortgage backed securities.  Of course, if you asked borrowers about 18 months ago (and many even today), you might have thought it stood for Commercial Mortgage Bull $hit.  When CMBS financing was introduced to the commercial real estate industry earlier in the decade, it was viewed as a Godsend.  This was because rates and terms were better than those being put out on term sheets from conventional banks.  The reason for this, of course was that the loan originators (often large banks) would not keep these loans on their balance sheets, but instead sell them off in tranches, with the help of investment banks, to individual investors who had a wider appetite for risk.  Rather than putting all of their eggs in one basket with one property, they technically owned pieces of multiple properties that were all pooled together.  On the surface this seemed like a great idea and a win-win for all involved.  Obviously, the lax underwriting standards for these loans did not (and maybe could not) have taken into account the tumultuous events of the credit crisis. Read the rest of this entry »

The effects of BP Plc’s oil well explosion in the Gulf of Mexico have reached beyond the worry of ecological devastation, and infiltrated local markets, commercial real estate being one of them. Leaking an estimated 70,000 barrels of oil a day compared to initial estimates of 5,000 barrels, the accident looks to be worse than the Exxon Valdez incident of 1989, where the inhabitants of the Prince William Sound are still feeling the effects.

Read the rest of this entry »

Timothy J. Lebold
Principal
Lebold Saha Asset Management LLC

Timothy J. Lebold graduated from San Diego State University with a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Administration with an emphasis in Finance. Upon graduation Mr. Lebold joined Prudential Securities (now Prudential Equity Group) where he was an Equity Associate. Working closely with the research department and sales traders, Mr. Lebold advised major institutions such as T. Rowe Price and Morgan Stanley. Following two years with Prudential Securities, Mr. Lebold joined a small, growing technology company in suburban Philadelphia. As the Director of Business Development, Mr. Lebold traveled the globe developing relationships and creating offerings for global technology innovators such as Qualcomm, Nokia and Symbian. While at NSTL, Mr. Lebold was responsible for new business development, managing a large service team and developing new offerings to service the ever-changing wireless industry.

After NSTL, Mr. Lebold left to pursue entrepreneurial endeavors and manage a growing investment portfolio. At that time, Mr. Lebold was managing his own, relatively large, equity and real estate portfolio. The portfolio has since grown into a variety of investment vehicles that have been investing in equities, fixed income securities, high yield bonds, real estate and privately owned businesses.

Q: How has your strategy changed as a result of the credit crisis? Have you expanded/narrowed your acquisition criteria? If so, to what, and why?
Read the rest of this entry »

The Week of April 24- April 30

- Two of the largest U.K. REITs are proposing a merger.

- Amid the calamity, Goldman Sachs is underwriting new CMBS for Taubman.

- Is the credit crisis over for big banks?

- Is lower leverage what is making REITs the darling for property investors?

- Foreign buyers are starting to crowd the U.S. real estate investment market.
Read the rest of this entry »

Most people think of Disney World as a place for kids. Most people think of Florida as a place for the elderly.  Now, thanks to some  likely desperate,  possibly genius, and definitely confused residential real estate developers, the two have merged into one.

What am I talking about you ask?  Disney World for the elderly…that’s what. And no, this is not an April Fool’s Joke! Read the rest of this entry »

In past banking crises in Sweden, Britain, the U.S. and Asia, taxpayers picked up the cost of bailing out troubled institutions because the government had to act quickly to contain the problem and the banks had been so battered they couldn’t repay the money. Now, regulators want to tax banks to avoid the worldwide catastrophe that was the credit crisis from ever happening again.  More importantly, should such a thing happen again, governments want to avoid having to go to their constituency and explain why they are using taxpayer dollars to bail the banks out. A plan is gaining momentum both here and abroad.  The bigger question might be: in what form will the tax take, and are there any advantages/disadvantages?

Basically there are four different options: Read the rest of this entry »

An analysis of the housing crisis by Karl Case:

For the last few years, we have shed many tears
Living through a recession.
The economy’s broke and it’s not a joke,
When we talk of another depression.
Fifteen million without a job,
Foreclosures and banks that fail,
401K’s became 201K’s,
And everything’s up for sale.

Read the rest of this entry »

While many you have not even gotten to the ‘aftermath’ portion of the credit crisis, the federal government is busy not learning lessons with the benefit of hindsight.  Obama’s plan to funnel $30 billion to “small banks” is exactly the sort of central economic planning that effectively caused the crisis. Read the rest of this entry »