(TAMPA, FL) — As vacancy in the metro Tampa office market climbs and rents recede, property owners and investors continue to look for the turning point that will signal the onset of an economic recovery.
Marcus & Millichap predicts a 20.5 percent vacancy rate by year end. Rents are forecast to slide 7.9 percent to $17.23 per square foot.
I had the pleasure of sitting down with attorney Fernando Perez, of Perez and Associates in Tampa, Florida this week to discuss immigration issues with real estate investors. Mr. Perez has been practicing immigration law since 1982. He is a regular contributor on FOX News and Univision related to immigration issues. He is a “go-to” guy in Florida when it comes to business and commercial immigration.
I attended the recent OPP LIVE conference in London, UK this past October and was asked repeatedly about the process of acquiring a visa by those interested in managing distressed properties in Florida or buying investment properties to manage. With the currently weak dollar and the depressed real estate prices in the State of Florida, I certainly understand why there was such keen interest.
While this interview focuses on commercial real estate investment, many of the points Mr. Perez covers can be utlized for other purposes, such as buying or starting a business in the US, or a buying a beach vacation home. The important point I took from our discussion is the US is open for business and investment from foreign investors, but one needs to understand the visa laws and work with a professional that can help them guide the way.
Mr. Perez’ website is a wealth of information about visa requirements. Click here for more information.
Full Transcript
INTERVIEWER: Eric W. Odum, Lic. Real Estate Broker, Net Lease Commercial Advisory, Inc.
INTERVIEWEE: Fernando Perez, ESQ.
Eric: Hello, and welcome to another series from Net Lease Commercial Advisory. Today we have with us Fernando Perez. Thank you very much for joining us Fernando.
Fernando: My pleasure.
Eric: Fernando is an attorney that has been specializing in immigration law over the past 27 years. We’re very fortunate to have him sit down with us today to talk a little bit about some of the investment and visa requirements for investments, primarily with real estate, but also in covering a wide range of other types of activities in terms of buying business and whatnot.
Fernando has been a consultant in both the State Department and Congress, and he also has a face for television. We know he’s been on FOX news and Univision, in terms of consulting on immigration matters, and so we’re very fortunate to have him with us today.
So hopefully you will be able to get a lot out of this and it will be able to help you make some decisions. Thanks again Fernando.
Fernando: My pleasure.
Eric: Let’s talk a little bit about the immigration visa. Typically, what people understand is that to get into the United States when you’re buying real estate or a business, you’re going to have to put down a million dollars—invest a million dollars, and hire 10 employees. When I go out and I speak to people, that is the common perception, is that really accurate?
Fernando: Well it depends, which is a great lawyer answer. What happens, Eric, is that there are two separate investment visa categories under the immigration laws, and people tend to confuse the two. Now, there is a visa category which is called the EB-5. It’s also been referred to as the Employment-Creation Visa or the Immigrant Investor Visa. Now, the characteristics of that are that persons from any country can qualify, but it does require in most instances, an investment of at least a million dollars in a US business, and as a result of that investment, 10 jobs for US workers have to be created.
Eric: Okay.
Fernando: Now, while we’re talking—
Eric: Which is not really ideal for a real estate investor—
Fernando: Exactly. It’s not going to be feasible in a lot of situations. Now, there is a new variation that I will touch on with the EB-5 before I get into the Treaty Investor category. There is a variation of the EB-5 that is an investment in something called a regional center. Those are areas of the United States that have been designated by the government as distressed. Now, if somebody makes an investment in a regional center, the investment amount is reduced to $500,000 and there is no requirement that you create employment because the investment itself, which has been pre-qualified, is already structured to create employment in the local community. So that’s the EB-5.
The other investment category, and this is the one that really is the most practical to most individuals, is what’s called the Treaty Investor Visa or the E-2. The differences are that the E-2 is only available to nationals of countries with which the United States has a qualifying treaty.
Eric: Generally, what kind of countries are they? How many are there, do you know?
Fernando: There’s probably, off the top of my head, over 50 or 60.
Eric: It’s a lot, close to half of—
Fernando: It’s a lot. Most of Europe qualifies. England, Spain, France, Italy; all those countries qualify. Canada and Mexico qualify.
Eric: Those are the big three that are investing in the United States. It’s the UK, Canada, and Germany.
Fernando: Columbia, Australia; they are all over the world. So, for somebody like that who is interested in doing something like that, just basically contacting someone like me and saying, I’m from such-and-such country, is there a qualifying treaty? And we can tell them right away, yes there is.
So, assuming there’s a qualifying treaty, the next thing—and this is the thing that’s really important—is that when you’re dealing with the E-2, there is no minimum investment required.
Eric: A big difference from the E-5, which is a million dollars to $500,000.
Fernando: Huge difference.
Eric: I mean, really, no minimum amount.
Fernando: Exactly. And if the investment is packaged correctly, for example, I’ve had investments qualify with an investment of $7000. Now, that’s rare and there were a lot of other factors involved, but the point that someone needs to take away from this conversation is, don’t think that you have to have a certain sum of money ready to invest to be able to qualify for the E-2. That’s the biggest difference between the E-2 and the EB-5.
The second thing is that with the Treaty Investor category, there is no requirement that you have employees. If the investment in the United States, is able to generate enough income to support the investor and their family, there is no requirement to have employees.
Eric: Wow. That’s another big difference.
Fernando: Huge difference. Let’s just use a real example. Let’s say that you have a British family that comes over here and buys a strip center. It’s a commercial investment because their job is that they are renting this. That clearly qualifies for E-2 treatment.
Now, the only “employees” they may have may be independent contractors. Maybe they hire a company to mow the lawn to keep up the landscaping and somebody else to do repairs every now and then, but they don’t really have to have any internal employees that they, themselves, are supervising. That’s perfectly fine. As long as that investment generates enough money to support that family in the United States, then they are good to go.
Now, when somebody comes here in E-2, the spouse can get permission to work in the United States and the children are automatically authorized to go to school. The children don’t have to qualify for a separate student visa, the wife doesn’t have to qualify for some separate type—it’s automatic. Obviously there is a paper process, but it’s not going to be denied.
Eric: So let’s talk a little bit about the types of investments you can do. If I wanted to buy a residential property down the street, am I able to do that?
Fernando: Well, yes, you can do that. There’s nothing stopping you. This is nothing to do with investments per say, but this is something that’s also misunderstood, and unfortunately it’s also misunderstood by immigration sometimes.
If somebody is here as a visitor, which is a B1, B2—or for a lot of Brits and people from European countries, they can come in under the Visa Waiver Program, which allows them to be here for 90 days without a visa. Persons like that, it’s perfectly legal for them to buy a residence in the United States. They don’t need any special permit, they don’t need to change their classification to buy that residence.
So if they want to come here and, for example, buy a vacation home, and they want to rent it out for part of the year and come back and live in it part of the year, that’s perfectly fine. They don’t need a special category for that. On the other hand, if they want to really use this as an investment that will allow them to live in the United States on a longer term, then simply buying a residence won’t do it.
Eric: Essentially, we talked about four options for them today. So why don’t you go ahead and quickly summarize for our audience what those four options that we discussed—actually there are a lot of different options, but why don’t we talk about those four that we discussed, again, just to summarize things for our viewers.
Fernando: In the area of investment, and particularly in investment that’s real estate related, the four options are these:
The Treaty Investor category, which, as I mentioned before, is available to nationals of countries with which we have a qualifying treaty, requires no minimum investment amount, does not require any number of employees, and does not require the day-to-day management of the investor.
Then we have the EB-5 category in it’s purest sense, which does require a million dollar investment and does require the creation of jobs for 10 US workers. When it is a million dollar investment, it does require the active management of the investor, it does result in a green card, and it’s available to people from any country in the world. There is no qualifying treaty that precedes that.
A subset of the EB-5 is investment in a regional center. The similarities are that it’s available to anyone and it still results in a green card, but if you’re investing in a regional center, the investment amount is $500,000, you do not have to create any jobs, and you’re not going to be actively involved in operation of the business.
The last area that we talked about is if somebody just wants to come here and buy a vacation home that they are going to use three to six months out of the year, even if they are going to rent it the rest of the time or just leave it closed the rest of the time. It’s perfectly legal for someone to do that while they’re in the United States and simply a visitor for business or pleasure status, which can be someone who enters with a natural B1 or B2 visa, or somebody who enters under the Visa Waiver Program without a visa.
Eric: Perfect. So that summarizes, essentially, the four options that we have for real estate investors to get involved in the United States. Certainly, Fernando, as an attorney, has a considerable amount of experience in this area. We’re very thankful he was able to join us today. So Fernando, again, I appreciate your time, and hopefully our viewers got something out of it. I’m sure they did.
Fernando: My Pleasure Eric.
Eric: Maybe it will help some people in the future. Thank you very much.
This is significant news out of Washington, but not unexpected, at least by this blogger. I have long maintained that the regulators, Congress and other government bodies will do what is necessary to mitigate a commercial real estate collapse. Information of upside-down loan values and the huge number of performing/non-performing loans* is well known to the industry and regulators. The banks are in no condition right now to take massive hits to their balance sheets so close on the heels of the credit freeze and residential meltdown that we just experienced.
In their guidance, the FDIC is opening the door for banks to rework, negotiate through and prudently modify loans that are essentially deemed salvageable, even if they are considered high risk, according to current underwriting standards.
Separately, it should be noted that the IRS also recently provided guidance regarding CMBS loans to allow for an improved tax environment for lenders renewing ballooning notes that have excessive loan to value ratios.
*Performing/non-performing loans are those loans that do not meet current credit underwriting standards, but the borrowers continue to pay scheduled payments. This is a term that we will hear a lot in coming months. As bleak a picture has been painted about the CRE market, most of the issues with commercial real estate debt revolve around performing/non-performing loans.
Canadians and Brits have long been significant investors in US real estate and Florida is one of their most sought after markets. We posted on here recently about the pick up in activity many of us have seen in regards to inquiries about real estate investments from international buyers. We are headed to the Overseas Property Professional show in London this week and are anxious to check the pulse of the world markets. News from the Expo Real show for commercial real estate, held in Munich earlier this month, was surprisingly upbeat. We will definitely provide an update on the show upon our return to the US next week.
In the mean time, we came across this article regarding RioCan’s (Canada’s largest REIT and retail landlord) increasing interest in the US market.
RioCan Real Estate Investment Trust, the largest real estate investment trust in the country, is getting closer to a major move into the United States –even getting RBC Dominion Securities’ opinion on a potential deal.
“We are looking around down in the United States,” Edward Sonshine, chief executive of RioCan, said in an interview with the Financial Post. “There are just so many opportunities down there. There will be individual opportunities that we will ask one of the investment-banking outfits to look into for us.” (…..complete article on RioCan’s search for US commercial real estate )
…..All told, Tampa ranks 46th out of 65 metro areas by highest rate of distressed commercial property, factoring in the size of each market. Las Vegas ranked first, with an estimated 32 percent of its commercial properties in some type of distress, followed by Detroit, at 24 percent.
Comments:Daily, we receive phone calls from individuals looking for commercial real estate in the Tampa Bay area. Usually the prospective tenants will quote articles and facts about the commercial real estate market and then proceed to use these “facts” as evidence as to why they should be entitled to seriously under-valued rent or the right to purchase a property at pennies on the dollar. Adjusting the expectations of some clients can be particularly challenging. The reality of the situation is, however, that as sluggish as the market is in the area, it is really not that bad, particularly when compared to the rest of the US. Yes, vacancies are high. Yes, there are more distressed properties on the market than 2 years ago. Yes, you can find better deals that you could back in 2006. But, Tenants are still moving to the area (albeit at a reduced rate) and deals are still getting done. As of right now, the market is soft in Tampa….but it is not dead.
The Tax Foundation is a Washington DC based think tank that collects data and publishes research studies on tax policies at the federal and state levels. The group is most famous for its annual calculation of Tax Freedom Day for the United States, which it has produced since the early 1970s. The Foundation’s mission is to “educate taxpayers about sound tax policy and the size of the tax burden borne by Americans at all levels of government.”
The Foundation recently released their their 2008 “Consensus Survey” on owner-occupied property taxes of 775 counties across the US. Not surprisingly, Pinellas Counties fared pretty well, ranking 405, lower than the national average in Taxes Paid ($1641 compared to $1897), and Taxes as a Percentage of Home Values (.8% compared to 1.0%). Pinellas County residents did, however, pay a higher percentage of taxes in relation to household income than the national average (3.1% compared to 2.9%).
Hillsborough County did not fair as well, ranking as 277 highest. Hillsborough County ranked higher than the national average in Taxes Paid, Taxes as a Percentage of of Home Value and Taxes as a Percentage of Income. Below is the comparative chart, with Hillsborough and Pinellas Counties in relation to the US average.
I would be negligent if I failed to note that this report takes in to consideration homesteaded/owner-occupied property only. Data and rankings in this report would be considerably different for Hillsborough and Pinellas Counties (and presumably the entire State of Florida) if one were to include non-homesteaded property in this survey. Commercial real estate, multi-family housing and investment or second home owners pay CONSIDERABLY higher taxes than their owner-occupied neighbors. It is not unusual to see vacation home owners pay 5-6 times their homesteaded neighbors, with both properties being identical in every physical way.
For those interested in trivia, Apache County, Arizona pays the lowest property taxes in the country, $126/yr. We wonder if there are any governmental services provided by the county.
The Tax Foundation ranked Florida #5 in 2010 as the State with the “Best Business Climate” Index. This was unchanged from their 2009 report. South Dakota topped the list as number 1, while Wyoming slipped to number 2.
Florida Real Estate: Tales of Its Death Have Been Greatly Exaggerated
Comment: In a recent interview, Steve Hagenbuckle, Managing Director of TerraCap Partners states that Florida real estate, one of the hardest hit markets in the country will be one of the first to emerge. Foreign buyers from Germany, Canada, UK and China, among a host of others are beginning to descend on Florida to scoff up deals on real estate that have not been seen in years. While residential real estate is probably going to be the most significant beneficiary of the activity, commercial properties are also attractive, because of the weak US dollar against much of the world’s currencies. I would expect that most of the international buying activity in our area will be centered on coastal residential real estate in Sarasota, Manatee and Pinellas Counties, but there are increasingly compelling arguments for international buyers to consider commercial real estate, as well. Net lease properties with credit rated tenants are at their highest CAP rates in years and could offer outstanding value.
Excerpts:
(3:25 min mark)
Steve HagenBuckle (SH): “ …as we talked before, the southeast, right now as far as in the last 12 months, has seen 47% of all international investing has been in the southeast on the residential side. The State of Florida has taken on 26% of all international investing on the residential home side. So, Over 1 out of every 4 homes bought by international investors (in the US) is bought in the State of Florida. “
Bloomberg TV (BT) : “Where is the money coming from , you mention Canada, …we talked a little bit about China, what about for example the UK? Are these people actually coming to use the property?”
SH: Yes, they are vacation homes as well as investments….mostly vacation homes. They are seeing that there is so much affordability that they may not see this opportunity for a long, long time. So, they are viewing it as “now is the time.” We have a currency that is strong than the dollar currency. And, we feel that if the dollar is weakening or has the chance to do so, now is the time to move. We are seeing a lot of interest from Latin American countries. 54% of Germans, when they buy real estate in the US, they buy in Florida. And 37% of the folks from Canada when they buy real estate in the US, they buy real estate in Florida.
News hit the streets this afternoon that Blockbuster may close as many as 960 stores by the end of next year. The fact that the chain is struggling and management plans on shutting stores should not be terribly surprising to anyone. Netflix, Redbox kiosks, and Internet downloads have all cut in to Blockbuster’s market share. Since the early days of the Internet boom, analysts have predicted that Blockbuster’s business model would have to change dramatically if it were to survive. Even if Blockbuster successfully adapted, the face of the company would be dramatically different.
The news of more potential store closures is a reminder of the particularly precarious times landlords have faced over the past 2 years. Not only have owners seen the repricing of even healthy assets by as much as 30% to 40%, but tenant losses continue to mount with no predicable end in sight. Today, I set out to compile a list of store closures already experienced this year and found this list instead on David Bodamer’s blog “Traffic Court.” I will let the list speak for itself, but the sheer enormity of the number of store closures from various national and regional retailers is staggering.
“We saw a few glimmers of hope with credit losses, though it is still too early to tell”
“CRE is a looming problem and will be a bigger driver of bank failures….Residential is still a bigger issue, but commercial is catching up and I do think it will be a bigger driver of bank losses and failures.”
On “going slow” on bank closures:
“The FDIC does not mandate bank closures. That is the job of the OTC or other regultor. ..its the primary regulators call as to when a bank is closed”
Commentary: It is not terribly surprising that commercial real estate will be a bigger driver of bank failures. Anecdotally, commercial banks, with which I have had experience, package their residential loans and sell them to investors as securities. Although volume of commercial mortgage securities (such as CMBS) increased dramatically over the last decade, by and large, commercial loans (with larger margins than residential loans) have been portfolio holdings, particularly with community banks.
Eric Odum: I am Eric Odum from Net Lease Commercial Advisory. Today we have with us is Michael Carlson of Carlson Studio Architecture. Thank you so much for joining us today, Michael.
Michael Carlson: Thank you, Eric.
Eric: Today we are going to talk a little bit about LEED certification. Anybody that is in the commercial real estate game has been to the conferences, has been to various meetings, and has learned about LEED. But they aren’t really sure what LEED is. So, Michael, why don’t you take a little time to explain just exactly what LEED is and why it’s important to know.
Michael: Sure. LEED stands for Leadership Energy Environmental Design. It is a program put out by the US Green Building Counsel, so it is a nationwide program. Anyone can use it throughout the country. It is the same system everywhere. It is third party verified system, third party certification. So what it does is it is a system that you run through that proves that your building is a green building. There is a lot of talk out there in the marketplace about green buildings and you really need a third party certification system to prove that you’re doing what you’re saying you’re doing.
Eric: Absolutely. I understand that you had the highest or longest running LEED building in the State of Florida. Is that accurate?
Michael: We did. We had highest scoring LEED building in the State of Florida from 2005 through a couple of weeks ago in 2009.
Eric: Who knocked you off? You don’t want to say, huh!?
Michael: Uhhh….Willis Smith Construction here in Sarasota knocked us off!!
Eric: Okay, which building was it, by the way?
Michael: The Twin Lakes Office Complex is one of the first projects in the State of Florida to get certified. It got gold certification.
Eric: In Sarasota (Florida)?
Michael: In Sarasota (Florida).
Eric: Okay, very good. In terms of when we are talking about LEED, does this apply to an old building, a new building? If I am a current building owner, does this have any significance to me at all?
Michael: It does, actually. LEED has a lot of significance in the whole built environment so if you are building a new building, you use LEED for new construction. If you have an existing building, an existing commercial building, you use LEED for existing buildings. There is a whole system in place just to help you make your existing building healthier, more energy efficient, and more water efficient. There is also, if you are a tenant, you can use LEED for commercial interior. So, you if are just building out a space inside of another building, use the LEED CI system. There is even a LEED for home system so if you are working on a single family residence, you can do your home as a green home.
Eric: Let’s talk about this because obviously in commercial real estate, everybody wants to be environmentally conscious but it always comes with a cost. What are some of the benefits, some of the savings perhaps, or let’s talk about benefits that if you are getting a LEED certification that an owner, investor or tenant that is a LEED building that might be important to them.
Michael: Sure. There is a McGraw Hill study out now that talks about increased property values and certified buildings are showing an increase in property values from around 3% to 10% higher than comparable buildings in the same market place that aren’t green. Also, for tenant rates, if you are a landlord and you’re trying to keep tenant spaces filled, green buildings have about a 3.5% increase in tenant space occupancy rates.
Eric: And I suppose there are some savings there too and perhaps there an opportunity, depending on who is paying for the electricity – whether it is the tenant or landlord – in terms of energy savings. So what exactly have we found in terms of energy savings with LEED buildings?
Michael: Energy savings is the biggest thing. It really is the thing for buildings. They use a lot of energy; they need to save a lot of energy. LEED requires you to use 15% less energy than a standard building, a standard brand new co-compliance building. But we are seeing energy savings around 30%-40% is really typical for a typical certified building. You can push that up to 50-60-70% if you use some solar panels and do some other things.
Eric: And possibly even 100% I guess if you really wanted to go crazy on it, right?
Michael: You can absolutely get a net zero – that is the term, net zero building that doesn’t use any electricity.
Eric: But the reality is that it is around 30-40% and that in the State of Florida I think we run an average of about $1.50/sf (electric costs per square foot of office space). So we’re talking about a $.50/sf savings off the cost of running the building.
Michael: All the time, month after month, year after year.
Eric: What do you think in terms of…. let’s get into some specific things . Because I know solar, for instance, is an item that not only are we getting savings from, but we are getting tax credits from using solar. I understand that it’s both state and federal – is that true?
Michael: There is; solar power, solar panels, solar voltaic we call them, haven’t had a good return on their investment in the last 20 years. But now there are a couple of state grant programs where you actually get money back from the State of Florida and there is a 30% federal tax credit this year and next year to put solar panels on your project.
Eric: So that is a credit, not a deduction? It is writing it straight off your income tax. Right?
Michael: That is correct.
Eric: Wow! That’s a lot.
Michael: That translates into a return on investment now on solar panels of about 4-5 years. You get all of your money back from your initial investment.
Eric: So your return on capital is essentially a 4-5 year payback period on solar investment.
Michael: Right and those systems are going to last 20-25 years so you’re going to be making a lot of money on those last 15 years.
Eric: Obviously there are some benefits to the tenants as well. We were talking a little bit before, earlier in the day, about productivity gains for the people working inside the buildings.
Michael: There is. In addition to the energy savings and water savings that green buildings have, there’s the idea of having a real healthy interior environment. Green buildings use natural day lighting which really affects how people work and how they perform, how long they can do tasks and all those sorts of things. Productivity is a big thing. You can increase productivity from 5-15% in green buildings and when you take all the salaries of all the people in the building and you can increase their productivity by 10%. That is a huge annual figure.
Eric: You’re saying that natural light is the primary reason behind that? That natural light actually makes people feel better about wanting to stay and work and it makes them healthier? Is that true?
Michael: It does. There are lots of studies on natural light and the positive impact it has. It shortens hospital stays, it does all kinds of great stuff for people that are exposed to natural light. Now, you don’t want the glare and direct sunshine on your desk. It’s not like that. It’s the diffused, natural light that makes you feel better.
Eric: How long have you been dealing with the LEED and the green architectural type of work?
Michael: We’ve been doing it since 2000. When LEED Version 2.0 came out in 2000 we’ve been working with it and we’ve been working with it ever since. We’ve got LEED silver, gold and platinum certified projects and we’ve got many more in the pipeline ready to be certified. So we’ve been doing it a long time.
Eric: Awesome. Let’s try to summarize for people some of the advantages of LEED. We’ve got energy savings which is probably the first and foremost.
Michael: It is…it does a lot for you. It saves you money. Bottom line it saves you money every month.
Eric: So you’re saving money and it’s somewhere between 30-40% (of electric costs). There are tax credits for when we talk about solar. I think there is wind, but maybe in the State of Florida wind’s not a good example.
Michael: Wind isn’t very viable in Florida but in other states, tax credits apply to wind and to any renewable energy source; whether it’s solar, wind or geothermal. Solar hot water is another good thing in Florida that we can use.
Eric: We’ve got tax credits and you also talked about productivity. So we’ve got energy savings, tax credits and productivity. So when you are trying to make a determination whether you are going to do a LEED project, it really comes down to, and this is where most real estate folks are going to put the pencil to the paper and see if it really makes sense. There are definitely some compelling arguments where it makes sense to me that maybe a building owner, whether they have a new building or they are renovating a building, should at least sit down and consider some of these items.
Michael: They should because you should really consider what things cost you and sophisticated developers understand that. It may make sense to spend 2, 3, 4, or 5% more in construction because the payback is much, much greater than that. So you look at the life cycle cost analysis. You get a good design team involved and you look at the real cost of things over time – not just the first cost of things.
Eric: Terrific. Well, Michael, thanks so much for coming today. We really appreciate you and your input. Hopefully you will continue to have great success in the field. I know you have won a ton of awards and it sounds like you are in position for the next generation. We really appreciate your time today. Thank you very much.
Michael: Thank you.
For More Information:
Michael Carlson
www.carlsonstudio.org
941.362.4312
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This is significant news out of Washington, but not unexpected, at least by this blogger. I have long maintained that the regulators, Congress and other government bodies will do what is necessary to mitigate a commercial real estate collapse. Information of upside-down loan values and the huge number of performing/non-performing loans* is well known to the industry and regulators. The banks are in no condition right now to take massive hits to their balance sheets so close on the heels of the credit freeze and residential meltdown that we just experienced.
News hit the streets this afternoon that 
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