Ohio Real Estate and Zoning Lawyer Arnold Shaheen regularly represents purchasers and sellers of residential, commercial, and industrial real estate, real estate developers, and manufactured housing communities in both transactional and litigation matters.

RESIDENTIAL REAL ESTATE:

• Real estate purchases and sales:
  • Preparation and/or review of:
    • Real estate purchase contracts.
    • Deeds.
    • Mortgages.
    • Land installment contracts.
    • Promissory notes.
    • Easements.
    • Title insurance commitments.
  • Review of closing documents, including such items as the closing statement, survey, and any FHA or VHA or private lender loan documentation as well as the title insurance policy issued after the closing.
  • Real estate closings.
• Leases.

COMMERCIAL AND INDUSTRIAL REAL ESTATE:

• Real estate purchases and sales:
  • Real estate contract negotiation, preparation, and review.
  • Review and negotiation of all owner supplied documentation.
  • Negotiation and review of lender loan documentation and requirements for collateralization, including:
    • Loan commitment letter.
    • Loan agreements and covenants.
    • Mortgages.
    • Cognovit promissory notes.
    • Personal guarantees.
    • Security agreements and financing statements.
    • ALTA surveys.
    • Environmental reports.
  • Review of applicable regulatory requirements and the preparation of necessary applications for compliance.
  • Review of the availability of tax incentives and the preparation and prosecution of the applications for same.

REAL ESTATE LITIGATION:

• Legal actions to clear title.
• Partition actions.
• Boundary line disputes.
• Appeals to the Board of Revision and the Board of Tax Appeals to contest real estate valuations for real estate tax purposes.

ZONING AND LAND USE:

• Applications for conditional uses, variances, and rezonings.
• Hearings before planning commissions, zoning commissions, architectural boards of review, boards of health, and city council to adopt: rezoning legislation, amendments to existing zoning codes, approval of architectural plans, traffic plans, variances from health department regulations, the replatting of land, and preliminary and final development plans.
• Administrative appeals from the decisions of lower level administrative bodies such as those named above to the common pleas court for an independent judicial review of the administrative record.
• The defense of eminent domain proceedings and the prosecution of litigation seeking to declare zoning legislation unconstitutional either as enacted, applied, or enforced, which also seeks to recover damages for denials of property owners’  use of their property without due process of law or without equal protection of the law.

LANDLORD-TENANT:

• Evictions from apartments and manufactured housing communities.

NOTABLE ENGAGEMENTS:

• Client prevailed in litigation that resulted in a court order declaring Pataskala’s former ten acre minimum lot size requirement unconstitutional, which resulted in a substantial financial settlement after an appeal to the Fifth District Court of Appeals.  That court reversed an unfavorable ruling by the Licking County Common Pleas Court that had denied the client his day in court.  That minimum lot size requirement was ultimately found by the courts to have never had any legal effect because the public was never given notice of the proceedings to enact it and was never provided with notice of its existence.
• Refinancing of one commercial property located in Licking County in order to finance the purchase of another property located in another county.  The total value of the transaction: $9,757,000 (2008 inflation adjusted dollars). It was necessary to file and settle litigation and to pass municipal legislation within a sixty day window in order to timely close the transaction.
• Purchase of seven story high rise apartment building using funds from the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development. Building was constructed using a turn key arrangement. The total value of the transaction: $9,333,225 (2008 inflation adjusted dollars).