Special Servicing
Alston & Bird’s Special Servicing and Asset Protection team is uniquely positioned to help our clients formulate and implement effective and efficient resolution strategies. Our team members are both attorneys and counselors: As attorneys, we give comprehensive legal advice; as counselors, we strive to fulfill a more challenging role—rendering practical legal advice that can be efficiently implemented. In workout scenarios, our clients need a team that has done it all, and we deliver. Our team consists of lawyers and non-lawyers who have substantial expertise in a broad spectrum of disciplines and maintain one focus—helping our clients achieve their objectives.
COMPREHENSIVE PRACTICE
Alston & Bird’s Special Servicing and Asset Protection team members are preeminent transactional, workout, litigation and bankruptcy professionals.
Transactional Expertise. Our Special Servicing and Asset Protection team members have originated, serviced and restructured secured loans (CMBS and CDO) for lenders and servicers. As a result, our team understands the dynamics of complex transactions and industry trends.
Workout, Litigation and Bankruptcy Expertise. Our team regularly represents financial institutions in a variety of defaulted loan workout transactions involving bank-held, CMBS and CDO loans. Typical transactions include workouts, forbearances, discounted payoffs, reinstatements, note sales, deeds in lieu, foreclosures and REO management and sales. In each workout transaction, we strive to help our clients avoid unnecessary costs by avoiding litigation, when prudent. However, when litigation is necessary—foreclosure or otherwise—we work (with local counsel to the extent needed) to zealously enforce lenders’ rights through the courts in jurisdictions throughout the country.
Our firm also has full-service bankruptcy tax, and environmental practices enabling our team to provide the most comprehensive and effective representation to our clients.
EXPERIENCE MATTERS
Alston & Bird represents lenders and servicers in connection with the prevention and correction of monetary and non-monetary events of default. It is our view that an aggressive, proactive approach will often prevent future losses.
As loan structures have become more complex, we have assisted our clients in interpreting loan documents, co-lender and intercreditor agreements, and servicing agreements to ensure that collection and enforcement efforts comply with such agreements.
We have also assisted our clients in reducing the number of loans transferred to special servicing by working with our clients to proactively identify and correct problem loans prior to the occurrence of a transfer event.
We have extensive experience in staffing a variety of servicing matters and try to insure that the necessary level of expertise is provided as efficiently as possible. We have established teams, programs and form documentation in each practice area relevant to defaulted loan transactions and have successfully adapted these to meet the needs of a variety of clients.