REAL ESTATE LITIGATION

Scandaglia Ryan represents a wide range of clients in all aspects of real estate litigation matters – whether they involve commercial lease claims, restrictive covenant breaches, landlord/tenant controversies, foreclosures or mechanic’s liens. We help banks, finance companies, insurance companies and pension funds recover indebtedness and collateral. We also counsel lenders in foreclosing mortgages on hotels, apartment and office buildings, commercial and industrial properties, and residential housing developments.

Representative Matters

• Successfully settled a lawsuit for one of the country's largest retailers brought by a grocery chain alleging the breach of a restrictive covenant related to grocery sales. Obtained a highly favorable settlement on the eve of a preliminary injunction hearing, resulting in an outcome that exceeded the allowances of the original restrictive covenant.
• Represented a secured lender of a $64 million commercial property whose owners were in default under the mortgage and loan notes. We successfully prosecuted a state law foreclosure action of the property resulting in the client obtaining fee title to the property.
• Represented a California-based equity development group in the acquisition of a distressed Chicago area shopping center. S&R attorneys successfully defended against objections to the purchase of the property and ultimately acquired the property pursuant to a Section 363 Bankruptcy sale.
• Represented a Chicago-area land company in the successful prosecution of commercial lease claim against a national franchisor who had defaulted under the parties' lease agreement. After defeating a motion to dismiss, S&R attorneys negotiated a recovery of a substantial portion of the value of the 10-year lease including attorneys' fees.
• Represented the new commercial owners of a North Michigan Avenue building against a claim by the previous owner for the recovery of prior rents. We countersued based on the previous owner's failure to properly secure the required building and work permits before the closing. We successfully settled the case and recovered virtually all of the costs incurred litigating the permit issues with the City.
• Obtained a favorable settlement on behalf of a shopping center developer with one of the country's largest retailers for violating a restrictive covenant preventing the retailer from permitting banking activities on its premises. As part of the settlement, the retailer suspended the banking activity and amended the use restriction to explicitly prohibit any banking activity.
• Prevented the foreclosure of a client's property pursuant to the allegedly fraudulent conveyance of the property to a third party who had obtained a mortgage with no intention of repayment.