By Alan J. Kluger
A year ago, I blogged about how the changing real estate market in South Florida was impacting ongoing litigation dealing with real estate transactions.  As South Florida real estate values continue to rise, the litigation needs of our clients that work in real estate are changing rapidly and we are constantly evolving our strategies to meet the needs of our clients, their current projects, and their long-term goals.

Right now we are wrapping up the litigation that arose out of the recession and those cases will either be tried or resolved in 2014.  But we are seeing a lot of new cases arising out of new real estate transactions.  There are two main types of cases we are seeing right now.
First, many partnerships were formed during the recession to purchase troubled real estate projects.  Now that the projects are being rehabilitated, we are handling disputes relating to corporate control and corporate governance as partners begin to butt heads over the management of these projects.
We are also seeing suits for specific performance where the parties entered into contracts to purchase real estate at a specific price during the recession and now that South Florida property values have skyrocketed, the sellers are trying to renegotiate the deals.  We are seeing a lot of litigation to compel closing at the original contract price.
We have come a long way since 2008.  Our real estate litigation practice has been abuzz for the last year or so handling these new and exciting cases.  I expect that in the end South Florida will benefit from all of the growth that will come from these real estate transactions.