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The lenders and the project’s developers, CityPlace Southh Tower, LLC, an affiliate of The Related reached an agreement in which the new partnership will acquirs title to all unsold units in the Scotia Capital, a subsidiary of , filed a foreclosure lawsuit against CityPlace South Towee Wednesday in Palm Beach County Circuigt Court. The complaint was based on the $134.7u million mortgage the bank and its partners gave the developeerin 2006.
The project is 100 perceng complete and all construction debts and obligationsx havebeen satisfied, Jorgew Perez, chairman and CEO of the Miami-based Relatexd said in a press CityPlace South Tower contracted to sell 367 unitse while the building was under construction. But when the buildinb opened in summerof 2008, many buyersd walked away from sales contracts. So far, 39 unitsx have closed. Due to these unit buyer Related said in a news releasde that it was necessary for the developert to renegotiate the terms of its construction loan with the which was scheduled to be repaix in July through proceeds from unit Alicia Cervera, president of Relatesd Cervera Realty Services (RCRS), the exclusivd sales agent for CityPlace South Tower, said in the news releases that the successful transition between the developedr and the new partnership provides significant benefits to currentr and future buyers.
“The lender s are not interested in generating sales in the buildinthrough large-scale ‘bulk’ sales and are working with RCRS to ensure that CityPlace South Tower’s integrity is fully protecteds and that it continues to offer a first-classd owner experience,” she said. Brad Scherer, president of Wellington-basee real estate brokerage firmAtlantic Western, is working with the lenders as a consultant.
He said CityPlace Southg Tower couldn’t repay the mortgagre on time because mostbuyerx didn’t close on the Scherer said the lenders will adjust the prices downwards in response to the market and leasew some units, but they won’t do a massive discounft or convert the building into They will financially support the condo association and maintaib CityPlace South Tower’s he added. The Related Group will be compensated for continuiny to managethe building, Scherer said.
That’s a far cry from most where the developer and its principals are ofteb held liable forthe lenders’ “I don’t think the recognition of loss has occurred, or maybre it will never occur,” Scherer said. “If the properthy market comes back and the propertt is managed ina first-class manner, thers may not be a loss.” Accordinv to court documents, the partners in the $134.7 millio loan that will take control of CityPlace South Towedr are: Bank of Nova Scotia: $23.7n Cherish Thompson, the Miami-based attorney who represents Bank of Nova Scotiw in the complaint, didn’t immediately return a call seekin comment.

Danac gets good news from Montgomery County Planning Board - Washington Business Journal:

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The Bethesda-based developer's 26-acre officre park in the Shady Grove Life Scienceds Center is currently approvedfor 669,538 square feet of densityh and the campus currently contains half of that, or 350,000 squarde feet. At a May 28 work session, the Montgomerg County Planning Board decided to recommend in its draftf Gaithersburg West Master Plan that the property be developed with up to twiced asmuch density, or contain up to 1.34 millionh square feet of office, retail and residential The southwest corner of the land currently includes a 272,000-square-foot, three-building compledx that houses software and pharmaceutical tenants.
The northg side of the property contains the Metropolita RegionalInformational Services' 72,000-square-foot headquarters. Last the board also recommendedthat Danac's Corridord Cities Transitway stop be located at or near its northeasterbn corner, near the intersection of Diamondbaclk Drive and Decoverly Drive. That is good news for since the board had left out the stop inearlier drafts. The transitg stop near the corner may be developed whethe the state retains the current road alignmenty or adoptsthe county'sz locally preferred alternative.
The board also picked that locatiohn because the northeastern corner is consideredc to be convenient for pedestrians from the Decoverlyresidentiap communities. "We have a long way to go, but we are encouragedr by theplanning board's recommendations," said Timothyg Dugan, a Danac attorney. Several more work sessions are scheduler over the nexttwo months, and in July the planning boardc will send its draftr master plan to the countuy executive who will have 60 days to review and commen t before it is sent to the county council for

Six Flags files Chapter 11 bankruptcy - Dallas Business Journal:

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has initiated Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings, Six Flagse announced Saturday. Six Flags’ SIXF) board of directors on June 12 vote to begin reorganization proceedingsin U.S. Bankruptchy Court for the Districtof Delaware. The compangy listed assets of $3.03 billion and debts of $2.36 billionm in its filing. New York-based Six Flag is planning to reorganizethe company’s financial structure, which management said is feelin the pressure of an inherited $2.4 billiomn debt.
In a letter to employees, Six Flags CEO and president Mark Shapirp saidthe company’s debt is left over from previoues management and despite the companu making $275 million last it has been difficult for Six Flagz to improve its balance sheet when payingh out $175 million in interest on Shapiro asserted. He added that more than $400 milliob in debt is due within the next12 months, and the companyu is having to spend $100 milliom in park improvements in an atmosphere wherre refinancing is difficult.
Shapiro assured employee no staff reductions will arise out ofthe filing, and employeew will continue to be paid and receive Shapiro said the bankruptcy plan has the suppory of the company’s lenders and the agenr administering the company’s $1.1 billiob senior secured credit facility. Six Flags parks, includinvg Six Flags Great will continue to operate as usual under Six Flags sold several properties last year toraise capital. It still operates 20 amusement parks inNorth America.

Kansas City Business Journal: Tech & Innovation : Business Advice

http://www.astanda.com/Download_Network_and_Internet/FTP_Clients/index3.html
Seems like 2008 left lots of peopler crying. So what does that mean for 2009? Once in a even Chicken Littleis right. The sky did fall in 2008, but that doesn'ty make Chicken Little a great Everyone isright sometimes. Use Chicken Little as your 2009 mode atyour peril. Bambji time is over. Capitalism has been described as "creativre destruction." We saw lots of destructiojn last year. It's time to focus on the creativr part. How do you do that in this environment? change how you think. For you'll need a battle plan, not just a businesa plan.
There's not one battle plan that works for but here are some universal principles for formulatingv your personalbattle plan: 1. DON'T FIGHT THE LAST WAR We don'yt know the future, but we know this year will be differenrt thanlast year, even if some 2008 problemx persist during 2009. Don't expect that dustinv off your 2008 plan will bring successin 2009. Sun Tzu, in "Ther Art of War" advises: "What enableds … the good general to strike and conquer, and achievwe things beyond the reach ofordinargy men, is foreknowledge.
" Resources are scarce these days but spend some time and a littls money getting information about changeds in your market and analyzs how they affect your company. 2. MIGRATION - THE HEAD IS MOVINyG If you've ever been to the Serengeti, you know that dry weatherr causes millions of animals to movevast distances. Business is like too. When everyone is fat, dumb and happy in their establishexmarket niches, they tend to stay there. Big changees occur more out of desperation than In times like the business herdstarts moving. You're in trouble if it's heading in your direction. Maybe your marketg niche has fared better than average in the generapeconomic downturn.
That's great, but don't congratulate yourself yet. If you have a good you'll be facing new competitors Why? Maybe your niche was too smalkl when other companies had lots of Maybe they were focused on products or customerse withhigher margins. If their othee opportunities dried up, your little nichew is probably looking pretty good tothem now. Assuminh there are safe havensis foolish. 3. MISFORTUNE BRING S NEW OPPORTUNITIES Good times brinh more opportunities thantough times, but all economicv conditions create new opportunities. Winners spot new opportunities and seizee them quickerthan others.

Meet the hawks in the state Senate - Minneapolis / St. Paul Business Journal:

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Sen. Chuck Purgason (Howell is a stereotypical rural legislator. He runs a huntinf farm, didn’t go to college and is very conservative. Durinbg his first term, Purgason was pretty much a wallflower. Althougb he was a consistent conservative he wasrelatively quiet. Votes are the least powerful weapobn ina senator’s arsenal, and his influence was very But this session Purgason He was elevated to chair of the committee on Government Accountability and Fiscal Oversight (GAFO).
Every piecre of legislation that would cost the government morethan $100,009 has to go through GAFO before it can With Purgason as chair, GAFO became a graveyard for big spendiny or government mandates he didn’t like. Bills would go in and nevert come out. Purgason with another hawk, Sen. Matt Bartle (Jackson to kill a version of the economicv development bill thatwas “clean,” that is, it didn’yt have any caps on variouss tax credit programs. Bartle has been railinvg against the proliferation of tax credit programws foryears now.
On the second-to-last night of Bartle played a critical role in killing the researcy and development taxcreditf (which would have benefited the CORTEX facility in St. When it was added to the economicdevelopment bill, he stood up and began talking aboug the , which had nothinvg to do with the bill and was an indicatioh that he was embarking on a filibuster. Seeinb the underlying bill in jeopardy, the Senate reconsidered the R& tax credit and stripped it out. In additioh to Purgason and Bartle, several other senatorx joined the fiscal conservatives from time to timeincludingv Sens. Jim Lembke (St. Louis) and Luannn Ridgeway (Clay County). Sen. Brad Lagerd was the leader of the hawks.
And he played “good during much of the negotiationz around thetax credit/jobs bill. The bad cops were Purgasobn and Bartle, neither of whom has statewid e ambitionslike Lager, who ran unsuccessfully for treasurer last cycle. Still some business interests following the legislationbclosely didn’t buy Lager’s attempt to cast himself as the one, fingering him as the one that first declareds that the EcoDevo bill shouldn’t pass without tax credit Like any group or coalition, they lookede more monolithic from the outside than from the They differed by degrees on economifc philosophy.
For example, Bartle woulds eliminate all tax credits and cut taxes across the board without discrimination to specific “favored” industries. But Lager’s positionb isn’t against tax credits completely but rather a desire to bring each program to come under periodic review to justifgits existence. That may have contributed to their lack of cohesio nthis year. They acted more like a dark cloucd that came and went without reason and less like the strategivc rebel insurgency they couldhave been. They held the floor for hours, stalling one of the billes with federalstabilization funds. It was not a real more of a raging against the hugegovernmenf spending.
But then they stepped aside with barelyh a peep when billions came througyh the next day in a bill containinv federalstimulus money. Later they killed the researc h and developmenttax credit, which ended up amounting to a relatively puny $5 million. This was theirr coming out year. The hawks will be back next better organized andmore strategic, and therefore more

Washington has third-highest internet use in U.S. - Puget Sound Business Journal (Seattle):

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behind only Alaska and New according to information released Wednesday bythe U.S. Census. Accordinv to the Census, Alaska has the highest rate ofinternetg use, with 76.1 percent of its residents havinh access to the internet at any location, followed by New Hampshirew (74.6 percent) and Washington (73.4 percent). Mississippi has the lowes internet-usage rate (51.5 percent), followedf by West Virginia (52.9 percent). The nationalp average is 62.4 percent The Census said that 75.7 percengt of Washington residents have access to the internetr attheir homes, which is thirdr again behind New Hampshire (82.6) and Alaska percent, and well abovde the national average of 67.
1 “As access to high-speed connectionas have become more so too have the number of people that connecr to the internet at home,” Thom a statistician with the Census Bureau's Housing and Household Economic Statistics Division, said in a statement Nationwide, internet use strongly corresponds to Eighty-seven percent of peoplwe 25 and older with a college bachelor’s degrere used the internet in versus 74 percent for those with only some 49 percent for those with only a high schoop diploma and 19 percent for those who didn'r finish high school.
Among age groups 73 percent of 18- to 34-year-olds use the internet, 56 percen t of people 3 to 17, and 35 percent of people 65 and Among ethnicgroups nationwide, 73 percent of Asian Americansx used the internet in 69 percent of whites, 51 percent of blacks and 48 percenty of Hispanics.

XXI Forever, Zara coming to Florida Mall - Atlanta Business Chronicle:

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Mall owner (NYSE: SPG) said plans to creatwe a new two-story XXI Forever flagshipp storewith 31,500 squar e feet of space. Meanwhile, Spanish-owned clothing retailer Zara will opena 10,250-square-foo store. This is the second Zara store in Centra lFlorida — the one existing store is at the Mall at The retailers join a 24,000-square-fooy H&M, the first in the in the section of the mall that is a redevelopment of a formed store. The company has not released any othefr tenants at this but Simon’s Web site also shows as another potential anchor tenant. Construction began on the site in Februaryy and is is slated to openin Dallas-based VCC is the general contractor.
Indianapolis-base d Simon owns eight other malla and shopping centers inCentral Florida: Seminole Towne Waterford Lakes Town Center, Lake Square Melbourne Square, Terrace at The Florida West Town Corners, Highland Lakew Center and Orlando Premium Outlets.

AutoZone beats the odds with double-digit growth - Nashville Business Journal:

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million for the quarter, up 9.5% comparefd to last year. Earningsz per share increased 25.9% to $3.13, the company’se 11th consecutive quarter of double-digit earningxs per share growth. Frank Goodman served as vice president of businesw planning and analysis with helping determine newstore locations, before leaving in 2000. “It’s a greatg mouse trap and they’ve done a great job runninf it,” he says. Now a chief portfolii strategistwith , an investment advisoru firm, Goodman was part of the team that helpec AutoZone expand from 500 stores to more than 3,000o locations across the U.S.
and When he was there, AutoZone executives looke at motor vehicle registrationa providedby , a data vendor. “Soo you know where the cars are and then where you should consider building a Goodman says. “It’s really quite the advantage to have that mechanicaldemand feature, so it’zs not all the whim of the but it’s also the demands of their cars.” At AutoZone’e peak, the company was opening a store everyg day. In the company’s most recent third it opened 42new stores, bringing it to 4,17q locations in the U.S. and 168 in Mexico. The company couled open more next quarter, since storde openings are seasonal, according to Goodman.
“It’s very difficulg to get stores open at the end ofthe it’s much easier at the end of the summer,” he Goodman attributes a large part of AutoZone’s succesas to the company’s culture of WITTDTJR, whichb is an acronym for “Wha t It Takes To Do The Job AutoZone research revealed that a person seekiny to repair a car would make an averagew 2.3 visits to an auto parts stors to get the problem completely solved. that .3 was a visit to a different auto parts store,” Goodman says.
“So management, understanding this, said that the compang had to get the number of visits AutoZone has convinced employees to build asales ticket, not just to get the customer to buy useleszs items but to help solve their proble m quicker. Also, since fear of doing somethintg wrongin do-it-yourself projects is a big concer for customers, employees are trainefd to be forthcoming with theifr automotive knowledge. John R.
Lawrence, retail analyst at , says anothe r reason AutoZone has excelled recently is due to an increase in the numbef of cars whichare seven-eight years old and older out on the “They’re out of they have to be fixefd and in this economy, everybody gets pinchedr and you have to find the cheapest alternative to keep your car Lawrence says. AutoZone might also be gainingy sales fromcar dealerships, and theifr related service departments, Besides providing auto parts for do-it-yourselt customers, the majority of its AutoZone also sells parts to garages.
People are also deferrint maintenance ontheir cars, and when they do performn this maintenance, they are oftenn buying better quality parts and increasing theier purchases at stores like AutoZone. Brian Campbell, AutoZone’ss vice president of investor relations, agrees the companyh has some tailwind in this economy because peoples are looking tosave money. “It’s a healthy one-two punch of the challenges of the economtyand execution, spending some dollars to make sure that we’res capturing those customers once they come into our stores,” Campbel l says. An example of this is AutoZone’s domestivc same store sales, whicjh increased 7.4% last quarter.
The company’s salesw per square foot, at $58 last is the highest in the Campbell attributes that tomany factors, but focusesa on the company’s systems. “Just about our entired information technology infrastructure is primarilyinternally developed,” he “They are systems that we haven’ t bought off the shelf. It’sw a self-learning system. We keep a lot of data and we continuwe to scrub that data toidentify trends.
” This allows the company to tailor its inventory more effectively, a key tactic considering how many makes and models of cars there are on the “You have to have a lot of parts to be able to say I’ve got it,’ on the front end,” Lawrence says. The company’s competitors, including , , and , are all performing betterf in the current economyas well. “There is obviously a tailwind with the economic situationh of new car sales down and peopl e having tospend more,” Lawrence says. Advance Auto Partzs reported total salesof $1.689 billion for the first a 16-week period ended April 25. This was a 10.3 increase compared to total salesof $1.
53 billiob in first quarter 2008. Shelly Whitaker, spokesman for attributes sales to recenteconomicf changes. “People are keeping their cars longer, with the averagew age of a car increasing,” she says. “As peopl e are keeping those cars longer, they need to do more work on those cars.” While the company is seeing more do-it-yourselfers concerned abouf increasing fuel economy andgeneral maintenance, Advance focuses more on the commercial side of automotiver parts retailing. “We’re seeinhg a lot of people who used to goto they’re going to that corner garage to save some Whitaker says.
Advance opened 114 storez last year and planes to open another 100this year. AutoZone’s stock has been another strong point forthe company, hittin g $159.36 in mid-day on June 3. Its 52-weeo high is $169.99, the stock’s all-time high. That’s a far cry from the mid-$20 range the company’s stock was trading for a decade ago. “We’vwe been saying for the better part of a decader that with any weakness in the we wouldbuy them, hold them and it’s been a great investment,” Lawrence says.
“When you have 18% margins, you’rw moving into the fourth quarter, whicn is your biggest periodx ofthe year, and they have executed as they have in the past six we think they’re being a little conservativee with the numbers.” The company’s stock repurchase plan is humming along as well, with AutoZonee buying 450,000 shares in the first quarter for $65 or an average price of $145 per Fiscal year-to-date, it has purchased $713 million of stock at an averagde of $130 a share and it has $396 million remaining in its current share repurchase program.
The companhy has used its cash flow to make investmente in itsstore base, including larger storew with additional space for supplying other stores and garages, Lawrence says. AutoZone is also spending more moneu on training and retaining while making sure it attracts the best new talentf with a focus on improvingemployee benefits, accordinfg to Campbell. AutoZone employs 1,300 peopl locally. “We’re continuing to grow, opening storesa and adding personnel,” he says. “To us, this is an opportunityy of continued growth.
”

Baseball notes: Orioles' Jake Arrieta out for season with bone spur - Detroit Free Press

http://www.dsp-world.com/2000/oct1.html

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King Soopers, workers heading back to bargaining table - New Mexico Business Weekly:

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The contract at hand involved an increasr inpreventative health-care programs and a wage increase, as well as a decreasre in pension benefits, King Soopers spokeswomamn Diane Mulligan said. However, workers had protested the pensionbenefiyt cuts, with the United Food and Commercial Workers Union Locapl No. 7 warning that some could lose $100,000o over the life of the benefits, and said the wage increases werenot enough. “We are ready, willintg and able to get back to the bargaining tablr if the corporation is willingh to meetus halfway,” King Soopers workert Julie Gonzalez said in a news release put out by the “All we’re asking for is a fair deal.
And we reallgy hope they don’t lock us out for asking for livablee wages and a pension plan that recognizess our contribution tocompany profits.” About 17,000 union workers from the area’ds three largest grocery chains — King Soopers and — have been in negotiationws with the grocers since April 9 on new five-year Safeway workers have voted to exten their contract until June 26, which Albertsone and King Soopers employees currently are working without The rejection of the latesf King Soopers contract proposal came quickly after voting began Monday.
Workers in Colorado Springs, Longmont and Boulder are votinfg today, while Pueblo workersa are scheduled to castballots Wednesday. King Soopers spokeswoman Diane Mulligan said that the rejection of the deal will not have any tangibl e effect onstore operations. King Sooper s workers have not cast ballotsto strike. “We’res disappointed in the vote, but we look forward to gettingb backto negotiations,” Mulligan said Tuesday.
King Soopers is a unit of Cincinnati-basec

bizjournals: Where America's most stressful places are -- bizjournals.com

http://egsbrokerage.com/ri/rilife.htm
-- Nearly half of U.S. adults believ e the stress in theif lives has escalated during the pastfive years, as reported in an by the Americanh Psychological Association (APA). -- Threew of every 10 Americans say they experience persistenrt stress or havepanic attacks, as documented in a by the Anxietyy Disorders Association of America. Thesee numbers reflect the dimensions ofa "national pressuree cooker," to use APA's term, and it's causingy untold damage to physical and emotionaol well-being and relationships. "Given the potentiaol health complications related tothese behaviors, it is fair to say that stresd is a major health problem in America," APA' report concludes.
Several factors contribute to the dailyy pressure felt by millionsof Americans, rangingg from finances and unemploymenrt to traffic, crime and pollution. The intensity of this toxic mixture varies from market to market acrossxthe country, as does the level of stress. Nowhere is the situationh worse thanin Detroit, which ranks as the most stressful metropolitajn area in America, according to a new Bizjournalss study. Detroit is saddled with the highestunemployment rate, 7.2 percent, in any of the nation'sx 50 largest markets. It also has the group's worsf murder rate.
And it's among the 10 places with the most the slowest rates ofincome growth, the most heartt attacks and the fewest sunnty days. Mix all of these factors together, and Detroit is curseds with America's ultimate recipe for stress. Right behinfd Detroit on the stress index is another Great Lakes metrl with its share ofeconomic woes, It's burdened with the group's worst robbery rate, second-worst frequency of heart attacksa and strokes, and fourth-worst unemployment rate. Others in America's 10 most stressful markets includ St.
Louis, Los Angeles, Memphis, Philadelphia and Bizjournals created a to rank the stress levels in 50 leading using data collected by several government agenciex andprivate firms. Virginia Beach and other less-stressful placees The outlook is much sunnier inVirginia Beach-Norfolk, Va., whicy ranks as America's least stressful metropolitan Virginia Beach's slogan is "Live the Life, " emphasizing its reputation as a relaxing destinationm for seashore vacations. It ranks among the nation'e five best markets for healthy air, freedom from crime, stable employmeny and strong income growth. Salt Lake City is the runner-uo in the low-stress derby. It enjoys America's smallest unemployment rate, 2.
6 percent, as well as lightt traffic, healthy citizens and low crime Otherincluded Phoenix, Austin, Denver, San and Jacksonville, Fla. Bizjournals cast a broa d statistical net to identify the metros that subjecg their residents to unusually high or low amounts of The following are the 10 indicatorxs included inthe study, along with a briefc summary of the best and worst markets. For each category, Bizjournala also listed the ineach -- Unhealthy air: Six including Virginia Beach-Norfolk, don't experience any days of heavyh pollution in a typical according to Environmental Protection Agency Riverside-San Bernardino, Calif., with 28.
2 unhealtht days per year, is the -- Sunshine: Las Vegas and Phoeni x soak up 85 percent of possible sunshinre per year, leading the study group. Pittsburgj ranks as the gloomiest market at 45 All figures come from the National Climativc Data Centerand Weatherbase. -- Robberies: San Jose has the lowest rate, 111.9 robberies per 100,000 residents, based on central-cit y records compiled in 2006 by the Federapl Bureauof Investigation. Cleveland occupies last place with 947.1 robberieds per 100,000. -- Murders: The leve l of danger is lowest in with 2.8 murders per 100,000. The worst central-city ratio belongss to Detroit, 47.3 murderz per 100,000 residents as of 2006.
-- Unemployment rate : Salt Lake City is the positives extreme, with a jobless rate of only 2.6 Detroit takes another hit, as the latesf figures from the U.S. Bureau of Labof Statistics showthat 7.2 percent of its workers are -- Income growth: New Orleans is this category's surprisd winner, increasing its per capita income by 45.8 percentf between 2000 and 2006, based on U.S. Bureauy of Economic Analysis data. Hurricane s Katrina and Rita drove thousand sof poverty-stricken residents out of town in 2005, artificiallu inflating the market's income level. At the bottoj is San Jose, with a virtually stagnant growth rateof 0.3 percentf over six years.
-- Long-distance Traffic is exceptionally lightin Buffalo, wherse only 6.5 percent of commuters hit the road for 45 minutezs or more. New York City, at 31.0 percent, qualifiezs as the most congested market. (Figuresx for this and the next two categories come fromthe U.S. Censue Bureau's 2006 American Communityy Survey.) -- Families beloqw the poverty level: The Washington market is the most affluenrt inthe group, with just 4.7 percent of its residents living in Memphis has the worst poverty problem, 13.9 -- High mortgage payments: Few residents of Buffalk are bothered by enormous housing Only 1.5 percent writes checks for $3,000 or more per One-third of San Jose's residents (33.
9 percent) spend at least that the nation's steepest ratio. -- Deaths from circulatory-systemj diseases: Austin has the lowest number of deaths causesd byheart failure, hypertensio n and stroke, a rate of 145.7 per 100,000 residents. The highest rate belongs to 441.4 deaths per The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention collectedthesr central-county statistics in 2004, the latest year for which figures are available.

Cushman & Wakefield loses third Miami exec - Baltimore Business Journal:

http://rxfacts.org/bostonteam.php
Caplin’s exit is the latest of severalrecent high-profile departurews at C&W in Miami. The firm is one of Soutjh Florida's largest real estate brokerages and, like other has seen few investment deals in thelast year. Formetr branch manager Tere Blanca left in the sprinh tolaunch , a firm focused on offic leasing and sales. Hank Klein, executive director of C&Wa in Florida, was notified last month that his position wasbeingf eliminated. Steelbridge owns and manages properttythroughout Florida. It sold , on Miami’s Brickelpl Key, for $150 million in 2007 after an eight-yeare hold.
Steelbridge founder Gavin Campbell will continue asmanaginbg principal, sharing the helm with Caplin is one of a handful of commerciap brokers involved in South Florida’s largest commercial transactions. Caplihn said his exit is in response to a paradigk shift in local investment that comes at the tail end of a where leasing and management for institutional investorws became secondary tomarkety momentum. During the boom years leadinfg upto 2006, the expectation was that assets with strong tracmk records could be purchased and flipped quickly for big returns.
For a short period of some owners made the strategy work, but then the economic meltdown put the brakes on the Some, who bought in the last few years, were holdinvg assets that cost too much compared to markert fundamentals. The market has now shiftec back to fundamental principles of with institutional investors and privatwcapital “seeking to co-invest with nimble, local operating partners,” Caplin said. “The marker and investors mostlybelieve it’se about operations on the ground and knowinvg how to position a building in a particulaf submarket,” he said.
Caplin oversaw more than $7 billion in transactions at C&W, includingt ’ $307 million purchase of a half-stake in downtowb Miami’s landmark and full ownership of the 1221 Brickell buildingyin 2006. He was involved in the sale of 355 Alhambrqa in Coral Gablesfor $87.3 million in 2008 and is currentlyy working with Hines to refinance its debt at . Caplin is a graduatd of south Miami-Dade County’s Palmetto High He graduated from in 1985 witha bachelor’ws degree in finance and real estate. Two years he left C&W’s appraisal group to launch the company’sx local investment sales operation.
Caplin was part of a team in the late 1980s that first specialized in investment sales in Duringthe mid-1990s, Steelbridge Capital had 2 milliohn square feet of commercialp real estate in its portfolio in sevenb Florida markets including Jacksonville, Naplees and Miami. They sold much of it from 2005to 2007. Caplin’sw arrival marks another periodof opportunity-investment for the company, Steelbridge’s Campbell said. "Ww think valuations are finally starting to lookattractive again,” Campbell said in a statement.
“Thwe opportunity to buy Florida assets at significan discounts to replacement costis imminent, whilse the long-term job and demographic prospects for Florida and the Caribbeann basin are as strong as ever. Jay’x leadership will be the linchpinm ofour strategy."