The way we deal with real estate has changed tremendously in the past few years, especially in light of the recent falls experienced by the equity markets. Today, investors increasingly look towards real estate to create a return on capital investment both through direct investment and managed real estate funds.
This has presented a considerable challenge to the legal profession; commercial real estate now changes hands on average every 10 years, as opposed to every 25 years as was the case in the early 1990s. Therefore, a number of things have changed: firstly pressure has been put on the lawyer to reduce the time it takes to complete transactions; secondly, detailed records are required on each stage of the transaction and thirdly, due to properties often changing hands in a matter of months, the information used in the earlier deal will often be relevant for future transactions on the same property.
