Holland & Knight’s integrated real estate practice seamlessly serves New York clients making the move to South Florida

While Holland & Knight is recognized for top-tier legal talent and excellent client service, there’s another crucial factor that sets it apart. Unlike most firms that are organized around their specific office locations, Holland & Knight focuses on its unified national practices across offices and geographic locations. This seamless, one-firm approach gives its clients unparalleled access to the experience they need, including in its acclaimed real estate practice group, which is particularly helpful with clients involved in transactions throughout the country and the world.

The substantial synergies between its large real estate practices in New York and the thriving Florida market have been particularly beneficial as Holland & Knight has seen its South Florida practice explode, with the market growing exponentially along with the robust migration from New York to Florida.

Currently, more than 300 professionals comprise Holland & Knight’s integrated real estate practice group, which collaborates and shares both legal and business resources and ideas across the firm’s 32 offices.

Yet rather than reporting to their local executive partner in the 32 individual offices, their work is orchestrated by Real Estate Section Leader Joe Guay and Deputy Section Leader Vivian de las Cuevas-Diaz, who coordinate the work through local Practice Group Leaders (PGLs) supervising the flow of client work to the attorney team best equipped to serve them.

It’s a distinction that allows Holland & Knight to provide superlative counsel and a broader geographic knowledge of norms and customs, all while adhering to the highest standards of legal practice across the firm.

We can provide consistent service because each practice area works the same way, and we regularly speak and meet with each other to get the benefit of skilled attorneys throughout the firm, says Partner and New York PGL Stuart Saft. We aim to create one-stop shopping for our clients.

Making inroads in the “sixth borough”

The Florida market is flourishing given the influx of New Yorkers to the area many jokingly have grown to call the “sixth borough.” “What makes this latest influx feel like a paradigm shift rather than a temporary fad is the number of very sophisticated, high-octane New York developers and investors who have committed to the South Florida market by opening physical offices, and in some cases even relocating their headquarters here,” says South Florida-based real estate partner Adam Zwecker.

Originally a Florida-based firm, Holland & Knight is distinctly positioned to deliver its signature service and bring more value to its clients, given its long-standing insight into the nuances of the Florida market. 

As Joseph Goldstein, the Miami PGL explains, “It’s extremely different—and challenging—to develop in Florida if you’re coming in from outside the market. That’s where our ability to offer a deep bench of first-rate land use attorneys gives us an incredible advantage with our client base.”

Although no one wants to think about the potential for litigation, Saft, who has been licensed to practice in Florida for 40 years and has an office in West Palm Beach, cautions it’s an area where New York developers can quickly find themselves out of their element. “They don’t understand how different the law is in Florida and that they can’t expect to just duplicate effective procedures from New York,” he says. “Our strength statewide in Florida becomes very important in negotiating contracts, developing and financing property, offering condominium and other interests, operating property, and especially dealing with defaults. Developers can’t be adequately represented by someone who doesn’t fundamentally understand the market differences that exist.”

Since the start of the pandemic, Saft has received numerous calls from New York investors and developers he represents who want to expand into Florida, Texas and other areas and are eager to continue their relationship with Holland & Knight.

Of course, no deal gets done without financing, and Holland & Knight has deep connections with lenders who also want to be active in both the New York and South Florida markets. “We can help lenders bridge the gap with our deep knowledge and market perspective. We know how to secure and collateralize loans, drawing on our in-depth knowledge and experience on the lender and borrower sides in both jurisdictions,” emphasizes Nick Milano, the Fort Lauderdale PGL.

Saft cites an example where a major development project got into trouble, yet Holland & Knight was able to navigate a soft landing by introducing the lender to a new investor. Without these contacts, the initial project team may have had to endure a disruptive period of bankruptcy litigation. “Instead, we could orchestrate a workout without the involvement of the courts because we knew how to get it done,” Saft says. “But you have to have the contacts in both communities to facilitate the resolution of major problems.”

Many ultra-high-net-worth families, family offices, hedge funds and other investors also are making the move to Florida, and Holland & Knight’s respected private wealth practice – the largest in the nation, with a particularly strong presence in New York, Boston and South Florida – stands ready to help.

“Our private wealth attorneys know the distinct needs of these clients and take the time to understand their specific goals, including protecting their anonymity as desired,” says Partner Christopher Boyett, the Miami-based co-leader of Holland & Knight’s Private Wealth Services Group.

We focus on an overall plan and structure that is customized for each client and ensure that all real estate assets fit into their broader wealth plans.

The right people at the right time

As clients increasingly deal with complex issues generated by changing needs, seamless service is more important than ever. For Holland & Knight, that means calling on attorneys throughout the firm as needed to get the job done.

Real estate partner Adam Zwecker saw this philosophy in action when he and an accomplished team of real estate partners, including Dan Faust and Jason Vaupen, joined Holland & Knight in 2021 from an established firm where they had very deep roots. “Our practices were growing and we were very comfortable, so we were only willing to leave for a really unique opportunity and platform,” says Zwecker. “What attracted us to Holland & Knight was not only its incredibly strong national platform but also the impressive roster of real estate lawyers in key markets throughout Florida as well as other crucial markets like New York and Texas.”

Zwecker realized he’d made the right decision his first two weeks on the job when he found himself forced to navigate an extremely challenging set of simultaneous closings all while trying, half-jokingly, to “remember what floor my new office was on and how to use my new computer.” The transactions involved representing a joint venture that was acquiring five adjacent development sites on which they planned to develop a 1 million-square-foot, mixed-use project. To complicate things, each closing had separate seller parties with separate attorneys, as well as some highly unusual probate, title and litigation issues that needed to be resolved in order to close.

Zwecker reached out to Joe Guay and Joe Goldstein to determine which Holland & Knight attorneys could best help him with his deal, and before long he had a cadre of colleagues experienced in those specific issues volunteering to help. With their support, he achieved the ambitious goal of closing on all five development sites simultaneously, playing a pivotal role in what will eventually be one of the most significant new projects in the Wynwood area of Miami.

“Needless to say, it was a daunting first two weeks in the office,” he says. “The fact that we could build this immensely capable and talented team of legal professionals on the fly made me immediately appreciate how many excellent lawyers we have at Holland & Knight who are true team players.” Although it was his first major set of closings, he soon realized the collaboration was not just an elaborate scheme to impress the new guy.

It’s been a pattern that has played out continuously since I’ve been here. I’ll be referred to someone with whom I’ve never worked, and they are enormously generous with their time, skills and knowledge and truly care about making sure any deal is successful.

And, he emphasizes, it’s a culture that’s uncommon at many large firms. “Every firm says they value cooperation and teamwork, but here it’s not just lip service. It has been obvious from day one on the job that Holland & Knight, despite its size, feels like an intimate and collaborative team of talented lawyers who enjoy helping one another.”

Examples of this seamless support abound. Saft shares a story of a client who was being offered the opportunity to acquire 300 properties, which entailed conducting due diligence on 300 locations over a weekend. Holland & Knight coordinated a team of associates around the country and completed the work, ultimately allowing the client to move forward with a lucrative deal. “No one thought it was possible, but it got done,” he says.

A similar tale comes from de las Cuevas-Diaz, who recounts a situation where 5,600 mortgages, branch sales and leases from different states and jurisdictions had to be reviewed within a month: “We created a war room in Miami staffed with attorneys and paralegals from several offices who were able to review and redline these documents. We completed it in only three weeks.”

Building culture for the long run

This type of collaboration is possible only when there’s a strong culture, and that’s at the core of how Holland & Knight operates. One foundational piece to help instill these values is the “all lawyers” meeting, which they just resumed in 2022 post-COVID. As de las Cuevas-Diaz underscores, there is no replacement for nurturing attorney relationships as it allows people who have been working together to put a real face to a name instead of relying on virtual interactions.

To help foster engagement at all levels, de las Cuevas-Diaz and Guay convene associate groups to seek input and share advice. “We want to make sure we have our ears to the ground to listen, and we invite a constant dialogue to connect the dots. We avoid a ‘sharp elbow culture,’ marked by unhealthy internal competition, but instead aim to grow our own,” says de las Cuevas-Diaz.

Almost universally she finds that younger attorneys’ biggest request is to be exposed to more people in the firm. That’s where Holland & Knight’s aforementioned practice of pulling in associates to get the right person to assist with complex cases helps foster better relationships. “We want associates to see how our firm culture works across jurisdictions,” explains de las Cuevas-Diaz.

There are no barriers or walls between partners, and the goal is to have our newer professionals become immersed in the firm as they advance and become young partners and eventually equity partners. It’s an integral part of how we do business here.

In fact, the culture is such a differentiator that de las Cuevas-Diaz shares there have been times they interviewed candidates who didn’t embrace Holland & Knight’s collaboration mindset and decided not to hire them despite impressive credentials. “We realize this method doesn’t work for everyone, and that just means we aren’t the place for them.”

As we look ahead to 2023, no one knows exactly what’s in store, but Holland & Knight is confident of one thing: “We are equipped to weather any storms specifically because of our culture. When one arm is helping the other and working together, we can’t help but find success,” says Saft.