CFO Intelligence Magazine – Winter 2023
Andrew Zezas
Real Estate Strategies Corporation, Strategist and CEO
A successful North American division of a European global manufacturing company was about to close on the purchase of a smaller competitor with significant real estate holdings — when the buyer had some second thoughts about existing facility leases at the target company, according to Andrew Zezas, Strategist & CEO of RealStrat, a New Jersey-based corporate real estate advisory and transaction services firm.
“The target company was in Chapter 11 bankruptcy when the deal was made to purchase its assets, so the buyer had an opportunity to renegotiate the commercial leases on the 14 North American locations,” said Zezas, who is also the Host, Publisher & CEO of CFO Intelligence.
“With little more than two weeks left before the transaction was set to close, Real Estate Strategies Corporation was engaged to see about restructuring the leases in a way that would be more favorable to the new owners without disrupting the existing relationships with the landlords. By moving in a timely manner to analyze the market and tapping a series of experts, we were able to renegotiate the leases on all 14 facilities while avoiding $17.7 million in costs for our client.”
For many businesses, he adds, “particularly middle market companies with under $1 billion of revenue, real estate makes up a serious asset class. But real estate-related issues are often neglected until a sale or merger occurs — and then it becomes a mission-critical rush job.”
Zezas has more than three decades of experience under his belt, leading strategy and executing acquisition, disposition, and advisory projects for clients, with a particular focus on office, distribution, manufacturing, technology, healthcare, and life sciences. He notes that now, with the chances of recession clocking in at 90% according to top economists, more CFOs and other executives are waking up to the value-added benefits of analyzing their companies’ existing or potential real estate holdings.