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| Real Estate & Land |
The Politics of the Deal
Michael Sisk
06/01/2004
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Indian burial grounds, endangered species and angry foxhunters are but a few
of the innumerable obstacles that can hinder landowners seeking to develop their
properties. Time and again, even the most experienced developers flirt with
circumstances that could scuttle a project, though more often than not,
patience, experience and compromise win out and success is achieved. “A deal
lives and dies a thousand times before it’s done,” says Don Shapiro, an officer
in the Beitler Co., a Chicago-based development, management and transaction
company.
| “Politics is a filter that helps you understand what you can and cannot
do.” |
It is certainly true that property development can be a long,
expensive process, one in which the assessment of risk, even with the best due
diligence, can prove challenging. Yet it is also true that such projects can be
enormously satisfying, not to mention lucrative. Given the right circumstances—and for many landowners, a partnership with an experienced
developer—properly developed real estate holdings can become powerful legacies
for both our families and communities.
To illustrate this potential, David
Hidalgo, president of Hidalgo & Co., a real estate firm in West Hartford,
Conn., recounts his experience working with a wealthy widow who recently
revitalized parts of downtown West Hartford through the development of some
underutilized property. The woman, whose late husband had run a large car
dealership just off Main Street, wished to sell the land where the dealership
once stood. Although it was zoned for something fairly unimaginative, like a
supermarket or box warehouse (and she received offers from those wishing to
pursue those types of projects), in the end, she struck a creative deal to make
her parcel the centerpiece of a major downtown redevelopment that will
eventually include residential housing, a medical office building, theaters,
retail space and a new town square and town green.
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