S.E.C. Real Estate Observer

This article is published by permission from a chapter in the book “Advanced Creative Real Estate Financing” by Chuck Sutherland Originally Published 2016 PARTNERS MAKE THE DEAL WORK Strategy Partners provide resources that you may not have or, at least, may not have at the moment. When you are stuck in making a transaction, ask […]

We’re going to discuss extreme due diligence. I call it “extreme due diligence” because a few years ago I started asking for additional information about properties, lenders, and owners than traditionally requested. Someone asked, “Isn’t that a little extreme?” to one of my inspection requests, and Extreme Due Diligence was born. I started asking for […]

I have failed! I have failed in marriage, in my judgment, in business, and many other areas. I also have had those dark nights of the soul, wondering if I could do anything right. All I could do was to keep on going. But I have learned much from failure. What I Have Learned from […]

By Chuck Sutherland, S.E.C. with contributions by John Brennan I was thinking about vacancy issues in retail properties the other day while looking at an offering package of a retail center, and I decided to do a little research. The following are some of the ideas I found most compelling. The Chinese word for “crisis” […]

*Excerpted from Creative Down Payments, a book by Chuck Sutherland Strategy As an incentive for a financial institution to make a loan, you can entice a third party to place compensating balances into the bank. Those compensating balances might be in the form of checking accounts, savings accounts, or Certificates of Deposit. Dick Janson, a […]

Strategy: An often overlooked approach to making transactions is the use of professional services as a source of down payment for a property.

1. Evaluate the Overall Market. [a.] Frequently, a problem with a hotel is not isolated to that hotel itself. The overall market has been impacted […]

If you own a piece of land and would like to receive the highest value, but you are currently unable to sell it for that value, consider adding some cash to your land and exchanging it for some existing or to be created notes.

by Chuck and Marilyn Sutherland Most S.E.C. members know that our hotel – Quality Inn Market Center – became a relief organization and shelter for evacuees after Hurricane Katrina hit on August 28th. We made a decision not to kick people out if they couldn’t pay and to feed them three meals a day when […]

Most real estate professionals naturally gravitate to and focus on the “numbers.” What is the cash flow…how can we increase the rental rate… are the Common Area costs being charged to the tenants…how can we reduce expenses so as to increase the “bottom line”? All numbers, oriented, practical, levelheaded issues to be addressed. And indeed, […]