Posts by Bison Tales

U.S. lawmakers introduce legislation to boost tax on carried interest

From ICSC Website U.S. lawmakers introduced legislation yesterday that would increase taxes on the percent of the profits investors collect from the deals their firms complete. The proposals to increase taxes on so-called “carried interest” are part a of larger attempt to reform the U.S. financial sector, but could end up hurting the commercial real Read More

Congress Plans to Destroy the Revovering Commercial Real Estate Industry

Just as commercial real estate is starting to recover… Congress plans to drive a stake through its heart and raise income taxes from 15% capital gains rate to 35% ordinary income rate. Tell your U.S. Senators about the unintended consequences associated with the carried interest proposal.  Please call 202-224-3121 and ask to be connected to Read More

Scarcity Premium Seen Driving Current Cap Rate Compression

With Little Quality Office Product in Play, Investors Vying Sharply for Low Hanging Fruit By Mark Heschmeyer Last year, capitalization rates on large office property sales rocketed from the mid-6 range to the mid-8 range. So far this year, cap rates have reversed course, falling back just as rapidly to mid-7 range. Under ‘normal’ conditions, Read More

Student Housing: Catch the Wave

By Christopher Hosford Student housing has come a long way from the bleak dorms of bygone days, or the meager off-campus options that were little better. Today, in many cases, student housing rivals market-rate spa communities in their array of amenities and cutting-edge style. Further, they enjoy generally strong overall occupancy and the prospect of Read More

First Multi-Borrower CMBS Securitization Prices

By Nancy Leinfuss NEW YORK, April 9 (Reuters) – RBS Commercial Funding on Friday priced a $309.7 million commercial mortgage-backed securities offering backed by multiple loans, the first sale of its kind in nearly two years and a benchmark for the recovering market. The so-called conduit deal is seen as a key gauge of risk Read More

Property Condition as it Relates to Your Refinancing

By Hal Reinauer The lending world has turned a more watchful eye to property condition and begun to take notice of reduced capital improvement programs. This attention has made it more difficult for those properties with some issues to find a reasonable lending solution, even with stable cash flows supporting the loan request. Appraisers and Read More

What are the best & worst nationwide markets for apartment investment?

The Apartment Finance Today conference was a great opportunity to share ideas with the best and brightest in the multi-family investment, development and finance industry. The final session of the conference was a panel with three economists focused on answering the key question on everyone’s mind: What are the best & worst nationwide markets for Read More

Apartment Finance Today Conference Update

I am back from moderating an all-star panel discussion at the Apartment Finance Today Conference in Fort Lauderdale, FL. Our topic: “Small but Mighty: Finding the Best Small-Balance Apartment Loan” was well received by a full house of real estate investors and developers.  As sources of capital are becoming harder to find our panel of Read More

Hometown Democracy? Sounds great in theory… who doesn't like Democracy? Until you learn more…

And you learn that Hometown Democracy shifts many of the planning and zoning decisions from professionals that have spent a career working through the critical issues to all the voters. America was not founded as a Democracy with majority rule but as a Republic in which elected officials are selected by the people to study Read More