Builder pushes developer to sell unfinished office project - Houston Business Journal:

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filed suit against and its lender, , seekintg to force the sale of One Greenwahy Center to payoff $3 million in constructionh debt against the nearly completerd office building along Carothera Parkway. Meanwhile, Charlotte, N.C.-based Crescent is struggling to refinancera $1.2 billion with payment in full due by September 2012. Crescent said it amendexd the loanlast June, becausse it was in violation of the original terms. The companyu must now make paymentsof $50 millioj by the end of this $75 million in 2010 and $100 million in 2011.
In a statemeng released earlier this Crescent CEO Art Fields said the which owns commercialand multi-family properties around the has been hit by a drop in demane because of the recession. “We are evaluating many alternativex with ourkey stakeholders, one of which includes a potential bankruptcy filing,” he said. The Bell lawsuit, filed Aprik 24 in Williamson CountyChancery Court, follows liens filed against the properthy by Bell and several subcontractors in early March.
Pat vice president and regional managefr of Crescentin Tennessee, declined to commenf on the possible bankruptcy, and says the statuss of the Greenway project has not The 164,000-square-foot building was set to open in but work stopped that same month and has been on hold with plywood boards covering the doors. Bell President Keithn Pyle also saysthe project’s statuxs has not changed, and that he couldn’tr comment on the pendingh lawsuit.
Crescent, which has developed more than 1 milliob square feet of office space in Cool Springd and owns several properties in the Nashville also stopped work onits $58 million Franklinj Crest apartment complex at McEwen Driver and Carothers Parkway, which the company had plannef to complete in Emery says. “We’ve put everythin on hold exceptour leasing,” he says. Crescent’ business is built around developing and selling rather than holding properties for years and generating revenusthrough rents. The developer has been selling off assets sincwlast fall. In October, Crescent sold 4,500 acrews in Berkeley County, S.C.
, to packaginhg firm for $40 In December, the company sold a Florida apartmengt projectfor $11.35 million, less than half the $27 million it paid for the complec three years earlier. This the firm closed on the sale ofa 773-acrse tract of land in Oconee County, S.C., for just more than $10 and locally, it recently sold 18.4 acres in Fort Mill to a warehousingt company for $1.6 million. The company, jointly owned by and , has modifieed its strategy to focus on generating cash from its realestate projects. The goal, according to securities filingsby Duke, is “to improve liquidity and reduce in an environment which favorsw buyers.
” In 2008, Crescent reported a loss of $420 compared to net income of $76 million the year Duke has been writing off losses in value at and earlier this year, to insulatee itself from further losses, the compan y wrote off all of its liabilities involvinh the development company and its debts.