Real Estate for Businesses

Devine Millimet's real estate attorneys represent a wide variety of developers, owners, and lenders with complex legal needs in the acquisition, sale, permitting, and development and leasing of major real estate projects throughout New England. We provide timely and creative solutions, whether the client's goal is to  pursue growth, redevelopment, or diversification.

Our attorneys bring a practical approach to success in all manner of real estate development projects and transactions. We bring together and coordinate planning and zoning, permitting, creative forms of development and ownership, strategic planning, issue identification, environmental solutions, problem solving, and financing through our attorneys and affiliated professionals as well as its extensive statewide contacts.

Today, delivering results for a client requires more than just applications and presentations. In some instances it requires deploying a media relations strategy to influence public opinion, implementing a grassroots effort to influence local decision makers, managing a ground game to influence the outcome of an election, or commissioning engineering, economic, or environmental studies to reinforce and advance a client's position. In some instances, it takes all of these tactics and more.

Real estate attorneys frequently utilize our Government Relations group to assist when entering each city or town to provide intelligence on the political landscape.

Complete transaction services are available from our team of seasoned practitioners who have achieved an outstanding record of success in helping clients overcome obstacles to their projects. We excel at guiding lenders, investors, and developers through the process of dealing with financing requirements, maze-like government regulations, and construction issues. With one of the largest Real Estate teams in northern New England, we have assisted clients with the creation of industrial complexes, office parks, shopping centers, and affordable housing, including the adaptive reuse of brownfield areas. In addition to all aspects of real estate financing and development, our attorneys provide expert leasing services for both landlords and business tenants, as well as providing exceptional services in tax abatement and eminent domain cases.

Our Services

• Acquisitions, dispositions and development of real estate
• Condominiums, commercial, residential and mixed-use (Including creative forms of units)
• Construction
• Land use planning and permitting
• Leasing
• Mixed-use developments
• Affordable housing developments
• Mortgage lending and borrowing
• Office projects
• Industrial projects
• Retail projects
• Tax exempt bond financing (institution and credit enhancing bank)
• Asset defense

Representative Matters

• Represented purchaser from Lucent Technologies of its Merrimack Valley Works in North Andover, Massachusetts, the largest manufacturing facility in the Merrimack Valley and southern New Hampshire. The 169-acre parcel with buildings having approximately 2 million square feet of space was referred to in the press as “the deal of the year” and as being rivaled in significance only by sales of downtown Boston office towers.
• Represent real estate investor with over 1 million square feet of commercial real estate properties in NH and Northern MA, in acquisition, leasing, development and all aspects of his business, including the acquisition, financing and leasing of 550,000-square-foot office park.
• Represent developers of large form based cod "New Urban" mixed-use project.
• Represented business owner/developer for the development and financing of a new hotel on a campus with an existing inn and restaurant.
• Represented national developer with respect to various aspects of acquisition, permitting, development and sale of projects consisting of more than 1,500 combined housing units in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Florida and California.
• Represent lenders or institutions in several tax-exempt bond transactions involving credit enhancement in the form of standby bond purchase agreement or direct pay letter of credit with bonds in principal amounts in the $10,000,000 to $30,000,000 range.
• Represent owners of a prominent Merrimack Valley orchard in leasing 13 acres in Methuen, MA to Target Corporation for a new 137,000-square-foot Target store.
• Represent national publicly traded company in the multimillion dollar sales of its commercial real estate properties in New England.
• Represent telecommunications company in zoning and planning matters for the construction of telecommunications towers.
• Acquisition of northern New Hampshire paper mill, with related hydropower facilities, railroad issues and solid waste disposal facility, including a covenant not to sue with State and compliance agreements with state and federal governments.
• Acquisition of EPA Superfund site for future residential development, including Negotiation of Prospective Purchaser Agreement with the State and federal governments.
• Represent developer in the planning and zoning for and creation of condominium for a medical office building and structure parking garage set in a tight urban setting adjunct to a major New Hampshire hospital in which the buildings are located on land condominiums.
• Regularly represent national companies with New Hampshire land use matters in locating facilities or developing projects, coordinating with corporate professionals within the client and other counsel.
• Represent redevelopment authority for the creation of a condominium for a mixed use development that is located in a city-center which was the site of a railroad station and includes building units, air space units which convert to building condominiums upon construction and the right to submit each building to a condominium form of ownership as sub-condominiums.