Financing

Apartments
01/09/09 4:59pm

Mosaic Avoids Foreclosure, Files for Bankruptcy

by
Condos, Condos for Sale, Financing, Foreclosures, Hermann Park, Highrises, New Construction: Residential
9 Comments

The developer of the Mosaic highrise overlooking Hermann Park — a limited partnership between Phillips Development & Realty and publicity-shy Florida Capital Real Estate Group — declared bankruptcy earlier this week to avoid foreclosure on a $71 million loan from Chicago lender Corus Bankshares. Florida Capital, originally the equity partner, will be taking over as the general partner.

The bankruptcy covers just the first Mosaic tower. The second tower, rebranded the Montage, has not yet defaulted on its separate $71 million Corus loan.

So how have sales been going at the Mosaic? It depends, the Houston Business Journal‘s Jennifer Dawson learns, who you ask:

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

, , , , , , , , , , ,
Commercial Real Estate
11/21/08 8:24am

Sonoma Walgreens: Not a Survivor

by
Financing, Openings and Closings, Retail, Rice Village
1 Comment

The River Oaks version of Michael Reed’s Examiner story about Sonoma’s failed financing efforts quoted here yesterday has an additional Walgreens update appended. The halt in plans for developing the Sonoma won’t change anything:

Meanwhile, Walgreens spokesman Robert Elfinger said Monday the Rice Village store will close Dec. 31 as planned and will not be relocated.

Photo of demolition on Bolsover St. last year: Jackson Myers

, , , , , ,
Commercial Real Estate
11/20/08 10:28am

Sonoma Developers: We Were So Close, Really!

by
Condos, Financing, Mixed Use, Openings and Closings, Proposed Developments, Retail, Rice Village, Streets
1 Comment

Sonoma’s would-be developers try to explain to West U Examiner reporter Michael Reed why the Rice Village retail-and-condo project was put “on hold” only a few weeks after the sales team sent out an email to prospective buyers claiming it had received financing:

Julie [Tysor], president of the Appelt Companies, said in an e-mail response to Examiner questions about the financing, “We had secured a substantial majority of the financing for the south building through the cooperation of some local lenders who have also supported this project since its inception.”

She said a number of factors contributed to the financing falling through, “not the least of which is historical world economic crisis that is unprecedented…”

So what’s going to happen to the site — which includes that block of Bolsover St. purchased from the city — now?

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

, , , , , , , , , , ,
Commercial Real Estate
11/14/08 11:04am

Sonoma in Translation: Not Gonna Happen

by
Condos, Financing, Land Sales, Mixed Use, Openings and Closings, Proposed Developments, Rice Village, Streets
5 Comments

Rendering of Proposed Sonoma Development, Bolsover St., Rice Village, Houston

Last month, a Sonoma sales rep told the West U Examiner that the project had secured financing — which turned out to be condo-sales-speak for “Maybe if people think we’re definitely going ahead we can still sell units and somehow find a way out of this mess.” Now Nancy Sarnoff reports in the Chronicle that the developer of the condos-and-retail complex slated for what used to be Bolsover St. in the Rice Village has told her that the project “is being put on hold ‘for the short term.’” This appears to be developer-speak for “We’re toast.”

Was the problem just “economic uncertainties and tumultuous credit markets”? After developer Lamesa Corp. and partner Randall Davis pulled their switcheroo, deciding to start with the project’s second phase because they couldn’t get the more grandiose first phase financed,

they went back to the market and were negotiating for a $70 million loan with 40 percent equity to build the smaller second phase of 85 units.

At that point they had nearly 70 buyers who had put down deposits. More than half were interested in the second building.

Translation: Almost half their buyers bailed.

There’s good news for the trashed 2-block section of the Village Sonoma leaves behind, though:

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

, , , , , , , , , , ,
Apartments
10/24/08 3:49pm

Hanover Uptown Apartment Tower: Officially on Hold

by
Financing, Galleria, Proposed Developments, Redevelopment
1 Comment

Proposed 37-Story Hanover Apartment Tower at Boulevard Place, Uptown, HoustonFrom Jennifer Dawson in today’s Houston Business Journal comes confirmation of part of Swamplot’s report earlier this week on the two highrises planned for Boulevard Place. The Hanover Company’s planned 37-story apartment tower isn’t moving forward anytime soon:

Construction was supposed to start this month, but that’s not going to happen because it’s too difficult to get a construction loan right now, says Hanover President John Nash.

He says it would be impossible to predict when the credit market would allow the project to move forward, but it could be delayed as much as a year.

Tower rendering: Solomon Cordwell Buenz, via the Houston Chronicle

, , , , , , , , , ,
Commercial Real Estate
10/24/08 10:10am

Go-Aheads for Sonoma

by
Condos, Financing, Land Sales, Mixed Use, Proposed Developments, Quicklink, Rice Village, Streets
No Comments

GO-AHEADS FOR SONOMA Randall Davis’s Sonoma development couldn’t get financing for its first phase, but the condos-and-retail project’s sales team is now saying it has financing for its second phase, planned for the south side of Bolsover St. And requirements for taking over the block of Bolsover between the two projects have been fulfilled: “In an e-mail sent Saturday, sales team member Keith Kaposta said groundbreaking at the Rice Village site was still expected in February following the expiration of Walgreens’ lease on the property at 5313 Kelvin St. In another development, the city of Houston said Tuesday that developer Randall Davis property owner La Mesa Corp. had successfully completed all work that was required by the extended deadline of Oct. 27. . . . [Public Works Department spokesman Alvin] Wright said even if the work covered under the letters of credit was not completed by the deadlines, the city would not get the property back. [West University Examiner; previously]

, , , , , , , , , ,
Financing
10/22/08 12:18pm

Gensler Layoffs

by
Houston Architects, Quicklink
4 Comments

GENSLER LAYOFFS A source who may have spent a little too much time with a chainsaw after Hurricane Ike reports on industry conditions: “It is super bad out there right now. Lending has absolutely ground to a halt. Most of my peers have almost zero pipeline beyond existing signed contracts or institutional work (esp. schools). [The Houston office of architecture firm] Gensler had layoffs this past week, though I would call laying off 16 people ‘trimming the dead limbs off the tree.’” [Swamplot inbox]

, , ,
Apartments
10/21/08 11:22am

Putting Off the Ritz: Boulevard Place Towers Stalled

by
Financing, Galleria, Hotels, Mixed Use, Proposed Developments, Redevelopment
1 Comment

Aerial View of BLVD Place, Showing Proposed Ritz Carlton and Hanover Apartment Towers

Remember the two 30-plus-story towers planned for Boulevard Place on Post Oak — the Ritz Carlton Hotel and the Hanover apartment tower? How have they been surviving the rumbling credit crunch?

A HAIF user last week

got slight confirmation that both the hanover tower and the ritz are going to be delayed at least slightly… they still expected both to happen, but they will be phased in.

Then yesterday came another comment:

i can confirm this in regards to hanover.

dont expect their tower to be built anytime soon.. i would consider it postponed indefinitely rather than slightly.

Followed by this:

As a sub on this project I will also confirm this. We have been told at least 6 months of delays.

But they still look great on paperscreen!

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

, , , , , , , , , ,
Alief
10/09/08 2:36pm

Delinquent Debt: West Oaks Mall Sale!

by
Commercial Real Estate, Financing, Foreclosures, Fraud, Malls, Openings and Closings, Quicklink
4 Comments

DELINQUENT DEBT: WEST OAKS MALL SALE! Here’s another chance to clean up some of the wreckage left by mysterious investor Edward Okun: “West Oaks Mall in Houston . . . has $81.3 million in delinquent debt attached to it in the form of commercial mortgage-backed securities. Joseph Luzinski, the federally appointed bankruptcy trustee for West Oaks Mall, said he hopes to sell the mall by year’s end, though store closures continue to hamper its value. [The mall] . . . is about 80% occupied, having lost a J.C. Penney, Linens ‘n Things and Whitehall Jewelers. The mall recently cut a deal to keep its Steve & Barry’s LLC store open amid that retailer’s bankruptcy. The special servicer for the mall’s debt, LNR Partners Inc., attempted to foreclose in September 2007, but Mr. Okun forestalled the move by putting the mall into Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection the next month. A federal grand jury indicted Mr. Okun on fraud charges last March after his 1031 Tax Group LLP, a company that helped facilitate tax-free real-estate deals for small investors, collapsed into bankruptcy and didn’t return $132 million of investors’ money.” [Wall St. Journal; previously]

, , , , , , , , ,
Commercial Real Estate
10/09/08 9:42am

Will the Village Get Its Bolsover Back?

by
Condos, Financing, Land Sales, Mixed Use, Proposed Developments, Rice Village, Streets
2 Comments

The West U Examiner‘s Michael Reed points out that Randall Davis has a looming deadline to complete some work on the block of Bolsover St. in Rice Village that was purchased from the city:

A condition, passed by the Houston City Council at the time of the sale, specified that some changes to the site of the high-end condo over retail project must be completed within one year.

The block was sold in August of last year so that Davis could use it as part of his Sonoma mixed-use development. Since then, Davis has run into problems finding financing, and the project has changed considerably. He now wants to build the smaller second phase — on the south side of the street — first. But the Walgreens currently on that site has a lease that won’t be up until January.

What needs to get done by the end of October?

The plugging and abandonment of the 8-inch water line within the street, and the relocation of the existing storm sewer inlets to Bolsover and Morningside.

The developer is “required to eliminate the appearance of the public street” at the intersections of Bolsover and both Kelvin and Morningside.

, , , , , , , , , ,
Financing
10/01/08 5:52pm

The Financial Crisis: Kinda Like Flooding in Meyerland

by
Flooding, Houston History, Meyerland, Price Trends, Quicklink
No Comments

THE FINANCIAL CRISIS: KINDA LIKE FLOODING IN MEYERLAND A rising tide sinks all prices! “When Dr. Mahmoud Amin El-Gamal, chairman of the Rice economics department, is asked — as he has often been in recent days — ‘What’s is going on with our financial institutions?’ he likes to begin his answer with an analogy of local origin. ‘It’s a lot like in the 1980s when the flooding in Meyerland caused the price of all the houses in the area to go down,’ he said, ‘even those houses that did not flood.’ El-Gamal said the same can be said of mortgage securities, many of which were ‘perfectly fine,’ but had been grouped with debts that would likely continue to go unpaid.” [West University Examiner]

, , , , ,
Commercial Real Estate
09/09/08 12:25pm

Sonoma: Bolsover Bulldozer

by
Condos, Demolitions, Development Strategy, Financing, Mixed Use, Proposed Developments, Rice Village, Streets
11 Comments

Demolition on Bolsover St., Rice Village, October 2007

Having torn down an entire block of buildings in the Rice Village for a condo project the company can’t get financed, Randall Davis has a better idea: Why not demolish the buildings on the other side of Bolsover — so they can build the second phase instead?

The Chronicle‘s Nancy Sarnoff reports that Davis and company have been unable to get a $100 million construction loan for the Sonoma mixed-use condo development he’s been marketing for a couple of years. Hey, that’s no problem! Just move on to the next project, and double down on the demo:

Now they’re negotiating for a $70 million loan with 40 percent equity to build the smaller second phase of 85 units.

“Hopefully they’ll respond positively since we have so many sales,” said Davis.

The sales, however, are for the first phase of the project, which has been 50 percent pre-sold.

And the second phase is on the south side of Bolsover, where Walgreen’s has a lease until January.

After the jump: marginal views of phase two!

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

, , , , , , , , , , , ,
Financing
08/29/08 8:39am

West Loop Nineties Revival Not Getting Enough Love

by
Galleria, Highrises, Houston Architects, Office Buildings, Proposed Developments
1 Comment

Proposed Novati Group Office Tower at 1600 West Loop South, Uptown, HoustonThe Houston Business Journal‘s Jennifer Dawson is reporting that the Novati Group’s plan to dust off a 15-year-old Ziegler Cooper design for a 20-story office tower and build it on the West Loop

appears to be in limbo. The deal isn’t dead, but it’s not moving forward.

The problems: finding debt financing . . . and that pre-leasing thing.

Meanwhile, Dawson expects Transwestern to announce details soon on a large new addition to Uptown’s Four Oaks Place — to replace the 24-Hour Fitness on Post Oak Blvd. owned by TIAA-CREF:

The proposed building being called Tower Five at Four Oaks Place is now set to be 30 stories tall, with 525,000 square feet of office space on 22 floors atop a parking garage with roughly 1,500 spaces, says Carleton Riser, head of Transwestern’s development group.

He says the building designed by architectural firm Pickard Chilton could break ground in the first quarter of 2009.

The fact that no tenants have committed to the new building won’t delay construction, Riser says.

Rendering: Ziegler Cooper

, , , , , , , ,
Financing
08/27/08 4:18pm

17 Problems with Royce Builders: Lavish Spending, Loose Keys, Roaming Rats

by
Hazards, Homebuilders
14 Comments

Royce Builders Building, 7850 N. Sam Houston Pkwy. West, HoustonWhat caused last week’s big implosion over at Royce Builders? And what’s happening now? A Swamplot informant tries to clue us in with this rich, extended view of the company’s problems:

Fact #1: Lavish spending by all of the Speers. At any given time one of two Bentley’s, Ferrari, Escalade or sports cars belonging to the family would be parked at the office. Shawn Speer and his wife Shonna were known for bragging about their lavish spending. Certainly, if you’re making money spend it, but when times are tight they were the only ones still spending money like water.

Fact #2: Example: Shonna told another employee about $30,000 shopping spree to New York and only a purse and few other items were on that steep tab.

Fact #3: As employees were crying and leaving Shonna and her best friend and manager Nicki K. were talking about moving forward with their new clothing line. This conversation opened up speculation that monies had been moved to accounts in Nikki’s name for this purpose.

Oh yes . . . there’s more!

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

, , , ,
« Previous Page Next Page »