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Stabilized assets · Cash out

The dirt under a performing building is the quietest dead money you own.

A developer who paid cash for land five years ago, built, leased up and is now collecting rent has an asset working hard above ground and one doing nothing below it.

Land bought for cash is unlevered, unproductive, and usually worth multiples of what was paid.
A land basis from five or ten years ago in a market that has moved is frequently worth two or three times its cost. That appreciation sits on the balance sheet doing nothing until it is either sold or borrowed against.
Versus the obvious alternative

Cash-out refinance resets everything. This does not.

The default move is a cash-out refinance. On a stabilized asset with an in-place loan at an attractive rate, that means giving up the rate, paying whatever prepayment the note demands, and re-underwriting the whole property to get at equity.

A land sale reaches the same equity without touching the building's debt, as long as the existing mortgage can be dealt with. Which is the one real constraint, and it is worth getting to early.

The constraint

The existing mortgage cannot sit ahead of the lease.

Our lease is unsubordinated, always. An existing fee mortgage cannot remain in front of it. In practice that means the land purchase, together with a new leasehold loan on the building, retires the existing loan at closing.

Which makes the note's prepayment language the first thing to check, before anything else. Yield maintenance or a hard lockout can make an otherwise excellent trade uneconomic no matter how good the land number is. Check it before you spend time gathering anything else.

What it looks like

Two numbers produce a real quote.

Stabilized NOI and what you paid for the land. Rent is sized at 25–30% of NOI, capitalized in the mid 6s, and capped at 35% of appraised value. Those two constraints usually converge within a narrow range, which is why a defensible number comes back fast.

Then the honest question: what is the money for? If the answer is a project you are starting next, the land under the finished one is usually worth more as funding for the new deal than as cash in an account.

Questions, answered

FAQ.

Do I have to refinance the building?

If there is an existing fee mortgage, yes, because our lease is unsubordinated and that loan cannot stay in front of it. We arrange the leasehold debt; we never hold it.

What kills these deals?

Prepayment language on the existing loan. Check yield maintenance and lockout before anything else.

How much can I get?

Rent at 25 to 30 percent of stabilized NOI capitalized in the mid 6s, capped at 35 percent of appraised value. On $535,000 of NOI that is roughly $2.2 to $2.7 million of land, subject to the appraisal cap.

Do my tenants notice?

No. Their leases are with you and nothing about their occupancy changes.

What do you need to quote?

Stabilized NOI and your land basis. That is enough for a first number. Documents come later.

Get your number

Two numbers.

Stabilized NOI and what you paid for the land. A land price, the annual rent and the coverage back inside a week.

Email us the property