A recent Court of Appeal decision from British Columbia may have devastating consequences for businesses engaged in corporate tax planning and asset protection. In Abakhan & Associates Inc. v. Braydon Investments Ltd. (“Braydon“), the Court of Appeal held that any transfer of assets made with a view to protecting such assets from current and/or future creditors might [...]
Tag Archives: Real Estate
BC ruling may affect Corporate Tax Planning
Posted May 1, 2012 | Bankruptcy and Insolvency, Business Development, Commercial Transactions, Corporate Compliance, Fraud, Legislation, Litigation, Real Estate, | Leave a comment
POTENTIAL PROBLEMS FOR LENDERS USING “ALL OBLIGATIONS MORTGAGES”
Posted March 27, 2012 | Commercial Transactions, Legislation, Mortgage, Personal Property Secured Transactions, Real Estate, | Leave a comment
An “All Obligations” mortgage is one which, by its terms, secures all of the mortgagor’s present and future obligations of all types, from time to time owed to the mortgagee, limited at any one time to the maximum principal or face amount stated in the mortgage. This type of mortgage has become increasingly popular with [...]
Expansions of the Concept of Latent Defects in Residential Real Estate Transactions
Posted December 8, 2011 | Access to Information, Condominiums, Due Diligence, Legislation, Mortgage, Real Estate, Uncategorized, | Leave a comment
A purchaser of residential real estate closes the transaction, moves in and then subsequently discovers that there is a convicted pedophile living across the street. The new purchaser has a young family living with him. Is the existence of the neighbouring pedophile a “latent defect” under real estate contract law sufficient to enable the purchaser [...]
New rules affect apartment conversions
Posted October 31, 2011 | Business Development, Commercial Transactions, Condominiums, Legislation, Real Estate, | Leave a comment
Many property owners have been working all year getting apartment buildings registered as condominiums, but this will be much harder when new laws come into effect on November 7. The government hasn’t quite slammed the door on conversions, but almost. See my Whiteboard Session for more details.
Implied covenants arising out of the transfer of land
Posted September 27, 2011 | Commercial Transactions, Mortgage, Real Estate, Uncategorized, | Leave a comment
Did you know that if you acquire title to a parcel of real estate which is subject to a mortgage, you will, without signing any document, be “automatically” obligated to both the mortgagee (the creditor) and to the party transferring to you (the original mortgagor/debtor), that you will be responsible for performance of all of the obligations owed to the mortgagee/creditor under the mortgage? To find out what the ramifications of this rule may be, please refer to my more detailed memorandum on this matter by going to same on “Implied Covenants”
Just when you thought you had an interest in land…
Posted May 9, 2011 | Access to Information, Commercial Transactions, Corporate Information, Personal Property Secured Transactions, Real Estate, Uncategorized, | Leave a comment
Where an owner of lands and premises undertakes to provide you with some rights pertaining to his/her/its realty, you would, in most cases, wish to be able to enforce those rights against property owners who acquire title subsequent to the current owner’s title holding. In other words, you wish to bind all “successors in title” [...]
When a lender gets too close to its borrower’s third party contractors
Posted May 4, 2011 | Banking Law, Bankruptcy and Insolvency, Commercial Transactions, Real Estate, Uncategorized, | Leave a comment
DANGER FOR A LENDER WHO GETS TOO CLOSE TO ITS BORROWER’S THIRD PARTY CONTRACTORS
Where a lender is making credit available to a borrower operating/carrying on a business or using the lender’s money to build something, the lender has an obvious concern and interest in how the borrower carries on its business and how it goes about building/developing a project. This often results in a lender extracting a number of covenants/promises from the borrower relating to what the borrower may – and may not – do in its business activities. Where a borrower gets into financial difficulty, the lender may take an even greater role in “controlling” or monitoring the borrower’s activities. This may range from the extraction of further undertakings/covenants from the borrower (further restricting its activities) to appointing a “monitor” to review the borrower’s activities on a day-to-day basis, to appointing a receiver for the borrower. The danger for a lender in doing this is that a lender may – note perhaps inadvertently – insert itself into the borrower’s affairs to such a degree that a Court later holds the lender was responsible to third parties for certain failures or shortcomings on the part of the borrower.
Provincial Government eases Restrictions on Sewage Ejectors
Posted January 7, 2011 | Environmental Issues, Real Estate, Water Management, | Leave a comment
By enacting Manitoba Regulation #60/2010 (effective May 25, 2010), the Manitoba government has somewhat eased its regulatory requirements relating to “onsite wastewater management systems”, specifically, systems commonly known as “sewage ejectors”. Under this latest Environment Act Regulation dealing with “onsite wastewater management systems”, property owners in specified situations are now given specified exemptions, which in [...]
Abandoned and/or Rundown Buildings Can Create Problems
Posted July 7, 2010 | Real Estate, | Leave a comment
If you are a property owner, manager, or mortgagee of, or, a neighbour of an abandoned and/or run-down building (residential or non-residential), the property’s existence in its woeful state can cause problems for you as well as for those at The City of Winnipeg charged with the responsibility of minimizing or eliminating such problems. In [...]
Condominium Conversions – Tenants’ bane or Owner’s boon?
Posted June 29, 2010 | Condominiums, Real Estate, | Leave a comment
There has been a lot of press lately on the subject of the conversion of apartment buildings into Condominiums. Based on this, the number of signs advertising converted apartments for sale and the level of activity in our office, it is clear that this is a very common event these days. Both the municipal and [...]