Residential

  • December 06, 2024

    $29.75M Deal Proposed To End Del. Latch Inc. SPAC Suit

    Attorneys for investors who bought into Latch Inc.'s Tishman Speyer-led, $1.5 billion take-public deal only to see their shares nosedive have tentatively settled consolidated class damage claims for $29.75 million, according to a Delaware Court of Chancery filing.

  • December 06, 2024

    Huizar's Big Brother Avoids Jail In LA City Hall Bribery Case

    The older brother of former Los Angeles City Councilor José Huizar on Friday avoided prison for lying to investigators about his role laundering bribes for the disgraced politician, with a California federal judge crediting the defendant's cooperation after he "finally decided to tell the truth."

  • December 06, 2024

    NYC Council OKs Mayor's Affordable Housing Plan

    The New York City Council passed a package of zoning reforms designed to spur housing production, greenlighting Mayor Eric Adams' City of Yes for Housing Opportunity plan after the city and state agreed to earmark $5 billion in funding to accompany the zoning overhaul.

  • December 05, 2024

    Property Insurance Policyholders See Hope Amid Headwinds

    In a year filled with property insurance challenges ranging from rising rates to limited availability, some policyholders saw gains in favorable state high court decisions, easing regulatory landscapes and insurer accountability.

  • December 05, 2024

    Rocket Mortgage Sues HUD, Hits Back At DOJ Race Bias Suit

    Rocket Mortgage, the largest U.S. mortgage lender, has punched back against housing discrimination claims brought by the U.S. government, countersuing in Colorado federal court to challenge what it argues are "conflicting and irreconcilable" mandates at play.

  • December 05, 2024

    Freddie Mac Beats Suit Over Payoff Statement Fees, For Now

    A Washington federal judge has tentatively let Freddie Mac off the hook in borrowers' proposed class action alleging loan servicer Nationstar Mortgage illegally charged fees for payoff statements, ruling Thursday that Freddie Mac can't be liable for conduct it didn't authorize — even if it did own one loan at issue.

  • December 05, 2024

    Yardi Must Face Rent-Fixing Suit With Tough Standard

    A Washington federal court has refused to dismiss an antitrust case accusing multifamily building owners of conspiring to use Yardi's revenue management software to inflate rental prices and found the claims should be treated as classic price-fixing allegations.

  • December 05, 2024

    Ohio Court Affirms Nix Of Bid To Double $42M Property Value

    An effort to nearly double the $42 million taxable value of a property to its recent sale price was correctly dismissed, an Ohio state appeals court said, upholding a state law barring complaints based on the untimeliness of a sale.

  • December 05, 2024

    Real Estate Fintech Co. Lands $350M Blue Owl Investment

    Real estate fintech company Splitero announced Thursday that it inked a deal with asset management firm Blue Owl Capital, which will use its managed funds to buy up to $350 million worth of home equity investments.

  • December 05, 2024

    Detroit Needs More Evidence In Census Row, Judge Says

    A Michigan federal judge gave the city of Detroit another chance Thursday to prove the U.S. Census Bureau undercounted the city's population and negatively impacted its federal funding, telling the city it wouldn't have standing to sue the federal government without such evidence.

  • December 05, 2024

    Airbnb Customers Drop 'Assistance Fee' Suit Against Insurers

    A proposed class of Airbnb customers permanently dropped a suit accusing two of the company's insurance providers of violating Washington state law by charging an "assistance fee" when selling travel coverage.

  • December 05, 2024

    Worker Claims Four Seasons Cheated Employees On Wages

    A former Four Seasons employee said the hotel chain cheated Los Angeles employees out of wages, telling a California state court that employees weren't paid for all hours worked.

  • December 04, 2024

    Amazon, Others Settle With Calif. Over Ex-Criminal Hiring Bias

    The California Civil Rights Department has announced it has reached individual settlements with Amazon, Ikea, the Los Angeles Dodgers and other employers over allegations they unlawfully rejected otherwise qualified job applicants based on their criminal history.

  • December 04, 2024

    Insurer Owes Coverage In Florida Keys Property Sale Dispute

    A Florida state appeals court partially reversed a lower court's ruling that an insurer didn't owe two insureds a defense in an underlying suit accusing them of conspiring with a Key West property seller, finding Wednesday there were insufficient allegations to trigger a policy exclusion.

  • December 04, 2024

    Lowenstein Sandler Adds Real Estate, Capital Markets Attys

    Lowenstein Sandler LLP has hired partners for its business litigation and capital markets and securities teams in New York City, the firm announced Wednesday.

  • December 04, 2024

    Building Contractor Agrees To End No-Hire Pacts

    Guardian Service Industries Inc. has agreed to stop enforcing no-hire agreements in its contracts that prevent building owners and managers from hiring the service contractor's employees after pressure from the Federal Trade Commission and state enforcers.

  • December 04, 2024

    RealPage Says DOJ's Antitrust Markets 'Hide The Ball'

    RealPage has urged a North Carolina federal court to throw out the government's antitrust case against it, arguing that enforcers have not shown that use of its software is raising rental rates in any part of the country and that landlords use it to offer competitive rents.

  • December 04, 2024

    Chase Will Settle Calif. Atty's Mortgage Rate-Lock Suit

    JPMorgan Chase Bank NA has reached a tentative, individual settlement with an attorney suing it for allegedly gouging him and other borrowers with sham mortgage rate-lock deals, heading off a potential class action.

  • December 04, 2024

    Atlas Real Estate Biz Gets Initial OK On Data Breach Deal

    A Colorado federal judge on Tuesday gave preliminary approval to a settlement between roughly 4,500 victims of a data breach and a real estate company that would see each proposed class member receive up to $5,000 in compensation.

  • December 04, 2024

    Homeless Vets Tell 9th Circ. To Deny Parking Access To UCLA

    A class of homeless, disabled military veterans fought the Regents of the University of California's appeal of its rejected stay motion, arguing in the Ninth Circuit that the lower court made the right decision because the veterans urgently need supportive housing on a Los Angeles campus.

  • December 04, 2024

    Farmers Insurance Off Hook In Homeowner's Fire Loss Appeal

    A California homeowner who alleged that an agent underinsured her scorched $3 million Malibu home cannot blame Farmers Insurance, a state appeals court affirmed, finding in a published opinion that the agent acted independently when obtaining a policy via a fire insurance pool for her client.

  • December 04, 2024

    Valley Sells $925M In Loans As Banks Shed CRE Loans

    Lenders, especially banks under pressure from regulators, are now taking big steps to distance themselves from commercial real estate. Those strategies include selling even performing loan portfolios at a discount, as well as starting foreclosures to draw buyers.

  • December 04, 2024

    Cozen O'Connor Adds Condo, Co-Op Board Expert In NYC

    Cozen O'Connor has added a real estate litigator from Tarter Krinsky & Drogin LLP as a New York City-based member of the firm's condominiums and cooperatives practice.

  • December 04, 2024

    NC Panel Reverses Prior Ruling Reviving Atty Meddling Claim

    A split North Carolina appellate panel has walked back its ruling reviving a suit against a real estate attorney accused of helping meddle in a property ownership dispute, declaring after a second look that the claim against him doesn't actually exist under state law.

  • December 04, 2024

    Senior Living Community Lands $473M Bond Financing

    A group of developers has secured $473 million in bond financing for the development of a 350-bed senior living facility in Irvine, California, a record-breaking financing deal, according to JLL, whose capital markets group arranged the matter.

Expert Analysis

  • The Clock Is Ticking For Fla. Construction Defect Claims

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    Ahead of the fast-approaching July 1 deadline for filing construction defect claims in Florida, Sean Ravenel at Foran Glennon discusses how the state's new statute of repose has changed the timeline, and highlights several related issues that property owners should be aware of.

  • Wiretap Use In Cartel Probes Likely To Remain An Exception

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    Although the U.S. Department of Justice's Antitrust Division has recently signaled interest in wiretaps, the use of this technology to capture evidence of antitrust conspiracies and pursue monopolization as a criminal matter has been rare historically, and is likely to remain so, say Carsten Reichel and Will Conway at DLA Piper.

  • Debate Over CFPB Definition Of Credit Is Just Beginning

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    The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has recently worked to expand the meaning of credit, so anyone operating on the edges of the credit markets, or even those who assumed they were safely outside the scope of this regulatory perimeter, should pay close attention as legal challenges to broad interpretations of the definition unfold, says John Coleman at Orrick.

  • A Closer Look At Feds' Proposed Banker Compensation Rule

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    A recently proposed rule to limit financial institutions' ability to award incentive-based compensation for risk-taking may progress through the rulemaking process slowly due to the sheer number of regulators collaborating on the rule and the number of issues under consideration, say attorneys at Troutman Pepper.

  • The FTC And DOJ Should Backtrack On RealPage

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    The antitrust agencies ought to reverse course on their enforcement actions against RealPage, which are based on a faulty legal premise, risk further property shortages and threaten the use of algorithms that are central to the U.S. economy, says Thomas Stratmann at George Mason University.

  • Ohio Tax Talk: The Legislative Push For Property Tax Relief

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    As Ohio legislators attempt to alleviate the increasing property tax burden, four recent bills that could significantly affect homeowners propose to eliminate replacement property tax levies, freeze property taxes for longtime homeowners, adjust homestead exemptions annually for inflation, and temporarily expand the homestead exemption, say Raghav Agnihotri and Rachael Chamberlain at Frost Brown.

  • In The CFPB Playbook: Regulatory Aims Get High Court Assist

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    Newly emboldened after the U.S. Supreme Court last month found that the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's funding is constitutional, the bureau has likely experienced a psychic boost, allowing its already robust enforcement agenda to continue expanding, say attorneys at Husch Blackwell.

  • What's New In Kentucky's Financial Services Overhaul

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    Kentucky's H.B. 726 will go into effect in July and brings with it some significant restructuring to the Kentucky Financial Services Code, including changes to mortgage loan license fees and repeals of provisions relating to installment term loans and savings associations, say attorneys at Frost Brown.

  • A Comparison Of FDIC, OCC Proposed Merger Approaches

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    Max Bonici and Connor Webb at Venable take a closer look at the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.'s and Office of the Comptroller of the Currency's respective bank merger proposals and highlight certain common themes and important differences, in light of regulators continually rethinking their approaches to bank mergers.

  • Tax Assessment: Recapping Georgia's Legislative Session

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    Jonathan Feldman and Alla Raykin at Eversheds Sutherland examine tax-related changes from Georgia’s General Assembly — such as the governor’s successful push to accelerate income tax cuts — and suggest steps to take before certain tax incentives are challenged in the state's next legislative session.

  • 11th Circ. Ruling May Foreshadow Ch. 15 Clashes

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    The Eleventh Circuit's recent decision in In re: Talal Qais Abdulmunem Al Zawawi has introduced a split from the Second Circuit regarding whether debtors in foreign proceedings must have a domicile, calling attention to the understudied nature of Chapter 15 of the Bankruptcy Code, say attorneys at Cleary.

  • A Look At New IRS Rules For Domestically Controlled REITs

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    The Internal Revenue Services' finalized Treasury Regulations addressing whether real estate investment trusts qualify as domestically controlled adopt the basic structure of previous proposals, but certain new and modified rules may mitigate the regulations' impact, say attorneys at Simpson Thacher.

  • What CRA Deadline Means For Biden Admin. Rulemaking

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    With the 2024 election rapidly approaching, the Biden administration must race to finalize proposed agency actions within the next few weeks, or be exposed to the chance that the following Congress will overturn the rules under the Congressional Review Act, say attorneys at Covington.